German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has expressed strong support for Montenegro’s European Union membership, saying the country should become an EU member by the end of the decade and rejecting proposals to tie its accession to the progress of other Western Balkan states.
Speaking during a visit to Dublin on Tuesday, Merz said Montenegro has largely fulfilled the requirements for EU membership and should not be held back because of delays in other candidate countries.
“Montenegro is ready to join. It has largely met all the requirements,” Merz said, according to Deutsche Welle.
The German chancellor stressed that the European Union must honor its commitments to countries that meet the accession criteria.
“Montenegro has made the greatest progress, so we should not keep it waiting,” he said, adding that the country “should become a member of the European Union by the end of the decade.”
The European Union has not admitted a new member state in more than 13 years, despite maintaining that accession remains open to European countries that meet the Copenhagen criteria.
Merz’s remarks come amid calls from some EU member states to link Montenegro’s accession process with Serbia’s. However, Serbia currently lags significantly behind Montenegro in meeting the EU’s accession requirements.
His comments reinforce Germany’s support for a merit-based enlargement process, under which candidate countries advance according to their individual progress rather than being grouped together.
