Analysis published by the Balkan Civil Society Development Network (BCSDN) on 01/08/2024 – accessible here.
On July 24, the European Commission released its annual Rule of Law report, which for the first time included the accession countries: Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia.
The BCSDN welcomed the inclusion of the four accession countries, recognising it is an important step towards advancing their accession process. This analysis summarises key Rule of Law findings in accession countries, provides an overview of the civil society environment as reported by the European Commission (EC), compared with BCSDN’s own monitoring, and briefly compares the state of civil society in accession countries with that in EU member states. Moreover, the analysis evaluates the Commission’s reporting on fundamental freedoms, attacks on CSOs, activists, journalists, public funding, and CSO-government cooperation in the accession countries, identifying areas well-covered and those lacking detail. Finally, it provides conclusions and recommendations on the report’s findings and suggests improvements for future EC Rule of Law cycles and report.