Balkan countries urged to join NATO

PODGORICA, Jan. 25 – With Albania and Croatia becoming NATO members last year, it seems that the alliance is also interested in having the other countries as part.
Last week NATO military committee chairman Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola called on more Balkan states to move towards membership in the alliance.
“Many Balkan countries have already completed their journey to Europe and the Alliance… Others are coming in different speed,” Di Paola told reporters after talks with Montenegrin Defense Minister Boro Vucinic in Podgorica.
Di Paola said that, “Ʃt is quite clear that the overall future of the Balkans is to be part of the Euro-Atlantic community.”
Montenegro in December was granted its request to join the membership action plan (MAP).
EU hopeful FYROM was blocked from further progress because of its name dispute with Greece; while Bosnia was advised to achieve the “necessary process in reforms” in order to join the MAP.
Only Serbia, although a member of NATO Partnership for Peace programme, seems to be reluctant to pursue the process of integration.
Since the fall of communism in the Balkans and a decade of conflict during the 1990s, most former communist republics have moved towards membership in NATO and the European Union.