Accession of Bosnia and Herzegovina to the European Union
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The accession of Bosnia and Herzegovina to the European Union is the stated aim of the present relations between the two entities. Bosnia and Herzegovina has been recognised by the EU as a "potential candidate country" for accession since the decision of the European Council in Thessaloniki in 2003. Bosnia and Herzegovina takes part in the Stabilisation and Association Process, and the relative bilateral SAA agreement has been signed in 2008, ratified in 2010, and entered into force in 2015. Meanwhile, the trade bilateral relations are regulated by an Interim Agreement. Bosnia formally applied for EU membership in February 2016, and it remains a potential candidate country until it gets a response from the Council.
The nation had been making slow progress, including co-operation with the war crimes tribunal at The Hague, but this came to a halt in 2011 when the EU refused to ratify the Stabilisation and Association Accord. The process restarted in 2014-2015, with the SAA entry into force on 1 June 2015 and the submission of a membership application by Bosnia and Herzegovina on 15 February 2016. On 9 December 2016, Bosnia and Herzegovina received the accession questionnaire from the European Commission.
The EU established a regional approach to the Western Balkans already in 1997, with political and economic conditionality criteria for the development of bilateral relations. The following year, a EU/Bosnia and Herzegovina Consultative Task Force was put in place to start the process. Since 2006, the task force is replaced by the Reform Process Monitoring (RPM).
Unilateral trade preferences ("Autonomous Trade Measures", ATM) were introduced by the EU for Bosnia and Herzegovina in the year 2000. Trade increased since 2008, and the EU products have been granted reciprocal preference in Bosnia and Herzegovina too. ATMs were suspended from 1 January 2010 by the European Parliament since Bosnia had not adapted the SAA, by then in force, to the accession of Croatia to the Union according to the traditional trade volumes.
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