Croatia officially backs opening of Chapter 23

After over three months of opposition, Croatia on Tuesday officially consented to a draft EU negotiating position on Chapter 23 in the accession talks with Serbia at a meeting of the Working Party on Enlargement and Countries Negotiating Accession to the EU (COELA).

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European diplomatic sources have told Tanjug that official information on the EU consensus on the opening of Chapter 23 should be released at around 5 pm Tuesday.

Sources in the Slovak EU presidency told Tanjug that, as soon as the official information arrived, the presidency would take steps related to verification of the consensus at Thursday's meeting of the Committee of Permanent Representatives in the European Union (COREPER) and calling an intergovernmental conference to open the chapters.

Diplomatic sources in Brussels said that the result of Tuesday's meeting and discussions on the opening of Chapter 23 was mostly based on the compromise reached at the Paris summit of Western Balkan and EU leaders Monday.

(Telegraf.co.uk / Tanjug)