Macron achieves his goal: European Commission publishes new plan to expand

On February 5, the European Commission published the document Improving the Process of Expansion of Reliable European Prospects. According to Albanian news agency Telegrafi, this document introduces a new methodology for negotiating EU enlargement. This methodology was proposed by French President Emmanuel Macron shortly after the October meeting of the EU Council, at which, due to the veto of France and Denmark, the decision to start negotiations on the accession of Northern Macedonia and Albania to the EU was postponed to spring 2020. The new methodology involves dividing the 35 chapters of the negotiations into 6 thematic groups: Foundations (rule of law, protection of human rights and freedoms, statistics and financial control, functioning of democratic institutions), Internal market (Freedom of movement of goods, services, capital and labour, consumer protection), Competition and Growth (Information Society, Media, Tax, Economic and Monetary System, Social Policy, Science, Culture and Education, Customs Union), Green Agenda and Sustainable Reproduction (Transport, Energy, Trans-European Transport Networks, Living Space and Climate Change), Resources, Agriculture and Cohesion (Agricultural Development, Rural Support, Food and Veterinary Standards, Phytosanitary Policy, Regional Policy), Foreign Affairs (External Relations and Security Policy). Each of the groups corresponds to a separate negotiation phase. In case the candidate country violates the conditions laid down in the negotiations on any of the phases already passed, the accession process stops and must be started first.