The Balkans: In the Era of Peace and Stability

After the turmoil brought on by the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia, southeastern Europe has entered a new era. The advent of this era was marked by efforts for reconciliation orchestrated by the international community, as well as the governments and peoples of the region, that reached a certain level of mutual understanding, tolerance, and cooperation. The countries of the region concentrated their efforts on establishing solid and functioning democratic institutions, transforming their economies to open-market economies, and creating conditions that would attract foreign investment, which would gradually lead to economic development and prosperity.

Members of the international community, for their part, joined forces to consolidate long-term peace and stabilization efforts in the region and offer a new vision to the countries of southeastern Europe, a vision realized through the expansion of European and Euro-Atlantic values and principles. This vision consists of the integration, without exception, of these countries in the European Union and North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Greece, the oldest member of both the EU and NATO in southeastern Europe and a country directly impacted by the instability in the Balkans in the 1990s, instantly recognized that its strategic interests lie with the achievement of the aforementioned goals. Consequently, it fully encouraged the economies and societies of its neighbors through active political support, public funding, and massive investment activity by pioneering Greek businesses.

Greece's economic presence in the Balkans is impressive—the country ranks as the top investor in Serbia, Albania, and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), and ranks second in Bulgaria and third in Romania. With direct and indirect investments of more than $22 billion, it has generated 200,000 new jobs in thirty-five-hundred enterprises. In the banking sector alone, Greek banks have established twenty-three-hundred branches. Furthermore, Greece has launched a $700 million program aimed at enhancing development in the recipient countries—Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, FYROM, Bulgaria, and Romania—and consolidating gains in peace and stability in the region. Simultaneously, Greece has strongly advocated the integration of southeastern Europe as a whole into European and Euro-Atlantic institutions.

Bearing in mind that these institutions are based on common standards, values, and principles, it is abundantly clear that each country's adaptation to such standards will be a long and difficult process. The common future toward which we strive will succeed only if those who aspire to partake are truly prepared to adopt and implement the reforms required to meet the accession criteria. This should be the message to all countries aspiring to join these institutions. This is a message not of exclusion but of inclusion. It is a message that cements the principles and values that constitute the foundation of our European and Euro-Atlantic family.

Good neighborly relations are the cornerstone upon which the countries of southeastern Europe must build a common European future of peace, stability, and prosperity. Enhancing regional cooperation and finding mutually acceptable solutions to outstanding issues with neighboring countries are also fundamental prerequisites for further integration of the aspirant countries of southeastern Europe into the Euro-Atlantic institutions. Provocative acts and statements that ring of irredentist connotations are incompatible with United Nations principles and common European values; they jeopardize the necessary climate of understanding among our peoples and are contrary to the European concept.

In early 2007, two of Greece's neighbors—Bulgaria and Romania—became members of the European family. Greece supported and actively contributed to the positive outcome of their efforts. Their accession opens up new prospects for Greece's role in southeastern Europe, as for the first time it shares land borders with members of the EU. Through its policies, new major transport infrastructure, and energy-transport projects it is now completing, Greece is dynamically transforming itself into a safe transport, business, and energy hub for the region of the Balkans and the Black Sea.

In addition to the potential opportunities in the Balkans, however, there are also challenges. Unfortunately, there are serious issues still pending, namely, the final status of Kosovo and FYROM's need to find...