EU Drafts Montenegro Accession Treaty as Tivat Summit Resets Enlargement Clock

TIVAT, Montenegro - The bay of Kotor is not the obvious setting for a turning point in European constitutional history, but something close to one unfolded on its shores on Thursday. The eighth EU-Western Balkans Summit, held at Porto Montenegro in the Adriatic town of Tivat, produced a confirmation that will have been noted carefully in every foreign ministry from Tirana to Belgrade: the European Union has begun drafting Montenegro's accession treaty.

European Council President António Costa, speaking at the closing press conference, said the drafting began last month. "For the first time since 2013, we are really counting down to the next enlargement," he said, according to remarks published by the Council of the EU. It was a statement of fact dressed as rhetoric, and the assembled room - which included French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni - would have understood the weight of it.

The summit, chaired by Costa and hosted by Montenegrin President Jakov Milatović, was the most heavily attended enlargement gathering in recent memory. According to reporting by EU Insider, Von der Leyen, Macron, and Merz all attended the Tivat meeting, making it a rare convergence of the bloc's three largest political forces around the enlargement table. Around 42 delegations and approximately 300 media representatives were present, according to The Diplomatic Insight.

Costa arrived having already completed a six-country tour of the Western Balkans, travelling through Albania, North Macedonia, Kosovo, Serbia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina before reaching Tivat on Friday. The itinerary was a signal in itself. Brussels does not send its Council president through six capitals in five days to deliver bad news.

The summit's concrete outputs went beyond ceremony. Leaders welcomed €673.6 million disbursed since 2024 under the Reform and Growth Facility, the financial instrument underpinning the €6 billion Growth Plan for the Western Balkans, according to a readout published by GlobalSecurity from the European Commission. The EU also confirmed it would launch closer cybersecurity cooperation between the region and the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity, and authorised the opening of negotiations to extend free roaming to Western Balkans partners - a small but politically visible benefit for ordinary citizens.

The geopolitical logic driving the renewed urgency is not hard to read. Russia maintains energy and political ties in the region, particularly in Belgrade, and Chinese Belt and Road infrastructure investment has built a competing presence in several candidate states, as EU Insider noted ahead of the summit. For Brussels, the calculus is direct: leaving the Western Balkans in an indefinite waiting room is not cost-free.

Yet the summit's most persistent shadow was cast by the one partner least aligned with its direction. According to The Diplomatic Insight, at last year's summit all Western Balkans partners except Serbia signed onto the final declaration - a pattern that reflects Belgrade's continued effort to balance its EU candidacy against ties to Moscow and Beijing. Serbia was present in Tivat but its domestic political situation, marked by prolonged protests over governance and rule-of-law concerns, makes its accession trajectory the most uncertain in the region.

Montenegro, by contrast, is aiming for full membership by 2028. The official summit website described the country as entering "the final phase of its European journey" following Thursday's gathering - though Brussels has been careful to frame all progress as merit-based and reversible.

Costa's framing at the closing press conference was pointed. "Their accession remains our priority and a crucial geopolitical investment," he said, according to the Council of the EU readout. "The process is and will remain grounded on merit and credible reforms. At the same time, our discussion today showed our shared ambition to deliver as soon as possible on enlargement."

The EU has said this before. What it has not done before, in more than a decade, is begin writing the treaty to make it official for any of the six. Tivat was the day that changed.

Sources cited:
- Council of the European Union - Remarks by President António Costa, 5 June 2026 (https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2026/06/05/remarks-by-president-antonio-costa-at-the-press-conference-following-the-eu-western-balkans-of-5-june-2026/)
- EU Insider - EU Leaders Head to Montenegro as Western Balkans Enlargement Enters New Phase (https://www.euinsider.eu/news/eu-western-balkans-summit-tivat-june-2026)
- The Diplomatic Insight - Europe Gathering for Western Balkans Summit, Happening June 5 (https://thediplomaticinsight.com/europe-gathering-western-balkans-summit/)
- Insight EU Monitoring - EU and Western Balkans push enlargement forward as Brussels eyes faster accession path (https://ieu-monitoring.com/editorial/eu-and-western-balkans-push-enlargement-forward-as-brussels-eyes-faster-accession-path/1242805)
- GlobalSecurity - EU-Western Balkans Summit highlights enlargement as a strategic investment (https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2026/06/mil-260605-european-commission04.htm)
- EU-Western Balkans Summit 2026 - official summit site (https://www.euwb26.me/summit)