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EUDA's work with candidate and potential candidates to the EU

Overview

The EUDA cooperates with candidate and potential candidates to the EU. Cooperation with these counties through the IPA8 and EU4Monitoring Drugs II projects strengthens shared preparedness by promoting common standards, fostering collaboration between national institutions, and ensuring that candidate and potential candidate countries can respond collectively and effectively to emerging drug-related challenges across the region.

Beneficiaries

The current enlargement agenda of the European Union covers the following countries:

More about the EUDA's work with candidate and potential candidates

Cooperation with EU Enlargement partners

The cooperation between the EUDA and EU Enlargement partners aims to familiarise these countries with EU policies and working methods while preparing them to take part in the agency’s activities. The collaboration focuses on building strong national drug information systems, including the development of national drug observatories. Partner countries are progressively integrated into EUDA activities by applying EUDA data collection methodologies and following standard reporting practices.

Support is also provided to help establish and further develop national early warning systems for new psychoactive substances. In addition, the cooperation includes training initiatives and capacity-building efforts that strengthen institutional and professional expertise. The EUDA offers guidance in drafting national drug strategies and related policy documents and assists in evaluating the readiness of national drug observatories and early warning systems to ensure they meet EU standards.

The EUDA supports the European Commission in the preparation of a detailed assessment of the state of play and the progress made by the candidate countries through its inputs to the Annual Enlargement Package. The agency provides inputs primarily to Cluster 1: The fundamentals of the accession process, Chapter 24: Justice, Freedom and Security, under ‘Cooperation in the field of drugs’.

What is a candidate country?

Candidate Countries (CC) mean that the status of country is “ready to start negotiations for membership”. Once the status is awarded, negotiations can start, but the start is not automatic.

Currently, we count nine CC:

  • Albania: granted candidate country status for EU membership in June 2014.
  • Bosnia and Herzegovina: granted candidate country status for EU membership in December 2022.
  • Georgia***: granted candidate country status for EU membership in December 2023.
  • Moldova: granted candidate country status for EU membership in June 2024.
  • Montenegro: granted candidate country status for EU membership in December 2010.
  • North Macedonia: granted candidate country status for EU membership in December 2005.
  • Serbia: granted candidate country status for EU membership in March 2012.
  • Türkiye: granted candidate country status for EU membership in December 1999.
  • Ukraine: granted candidate country status for EU membership in June 2024.

What is a potential candidate ?

Potential Candidate (PC) means that the country has been identified as one of who has the natural perspective of joining the EU, but does not yet meet some basic criteria (rule of law, market economy, peace, etc.) to be awarded the status of 'candidate'.

At present, we count 1 PC:

  • Kosovo: applied for EU membership in December 2022.

Status of all candidates

Country Status
Albania Candidate country
Bosnia-Herzegovina Candidate country
Georgia Candidate country
Kosovo Potential Candidate
Moldova Candidate country
Montenegro Candidate country
North Macedonia Candidate country
Serbia Candidate country
Türkiye Candidate country
Ukraine Candidate country

More resources

* Cooperation with representatives of the Georgian Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Health, their subordinated agencies, as well as other law enforcement bodies, within the framework of the regional project “EU4Monitoring Drugs” led by the EUDA has been suspended until further notice.

**This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence.

***As Türkiye is a full non-voting member of the EUDA Management Board and part of the EUDA's Reitox network, it is not part of the EUDA-IPA8 project.

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