For the first time in several years, the European Commission’s enlargement reports have sparked genuine anticipation in the Western Balkans. Albania and Montenegro appear to be making tangible progress toward EU membership in the foreseeable future. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, however, there was neither anticipation nor significant reaction.
A few years ago, the publication of the Commission’s reports would at least draw media attention. Experts would analyze the text, dissecting its diplomatic language and debating its implications. Not this time. Only a handful of media outlets translated the Commission’s communiqué concerning Bosnia and other Western Balkan states. Others limited their coverage to reporting that the EU Ambassador and EUSR in Bosnia, Luigi Soreca, had met with the Chairwoman of the BiH Council of Ministers, Borjana Kristo, to present the report.
In his official statement on the social media platform X, Soreca once again repeated the same rather hollow message Bosnia has been hearing for years: “When candidate countries deliver, the EU delivers too. The door to enlargement is open.” He added, “With political will and cooperation, the first Intergovernmental Conference is within reach. The EU will continue to stand by BiH every step of the way. The opportunity is there. The time is now.”
To emphasize the need for political will and cooperation in a country that arguably holds the European record for lacking both is, metaphorically speaking, like asking the European champion of indolence to run a marathon. By the time of writing, Soreca’s post on X had garnered just 13 (sic!) likes and four reposts.
In the Bosnian media, this year’s enlargement report was a prototypical non-event. On the day of its publication, headlines were dominated instead by the Constitutional Court’s decision to reject Milorad Dodik’s appeal, thereby upholding his ban from office for defying the decisions of the High Representative, Christian Schmidt. Paradoxically, Dodik is once again the political figure explicitly named in the report as responsible for “severe political tensions and escalation (…) from the Republika Srpska entity.”
The fact that Bosnia’s most significant annual event related to EU integration passed virtually unnoticed speaks to the very substance of the process itself. Judging by the Commission’s assessments of Bosnia’s (non)progress, the enlargement process has effectively become a non-process—a formal procedure that, at least for now, leads nowhere.
The European Commission’s score assessing Bosnia’s preparedness for EU membership in the 2024–2025 period increased marginally from 1.67 to 1.7, on a scale where 1 represents the weakest and 5 the strongest performance. This places Bosnia behind Kosovo, which scored 2.11, making it the lowest-performing “student” in the Western Balkans enlargement class. Reading the report inevitably leaves one shaking their head, wondering how the Commission justified an improvement of 0.03 points—and what that almost cynical adjustment is meant to signal.
A closer look at the report reveals that both its tone and substance point in the same direction: no tangible progress and persistently stalled reforms. Were it not for the belated adoption of the Reform Agenda—necessary to unlock funds allocated to Bosnia under the EU’s investment plan—there would be little, if anything, positive for the Commission to highlight. Even that modest achievement came late: the Reform Agenda was adopted only in September 2025, after a significant delay and following the Commission’s decision to reduce Bosnia’s indicative funding allocation by 10 percent.
Even a quick — and exceptionally charitable — reading exposes the scale of Bosnia’s EU integration disaster. The Commission’s report speaks of “stalled reforms,” “severe political tensions and escalation,” elections that “require substantial reforms,” a parliament that “can exercise its powers in only a partially effective way,” and a “decreased legislative output.” It describes governance as “increasingly unsatisfactory,” and notes that civil society organizations “operate in a constrained environment.” What follows is a long litany of “No progress was made,” occasionally interrupted by the faintly encouraging phrase “some minimal progress.”
Naturally, the question arises: who is to blame for Bosnia’s lack of progress? The main share of responsibility lies, of course, with Bosnian authorities and political stakeholders. The leadership of Republika Srpska, led by Milorad Dodik, has for years engaged in a cycle of secessionist rhetoric, threats, and institutional blockades, accompanied by an increasingly harsh anti-European narrative. Russia’s aggression against Ukraine—and Dodik’s open support for Moscow, rewarded in turn for his role as a “useful spoiler”—has only deepened this dynamic.
Meanwhile, the Croatian HDZ has quietly pursued its long-term objective of ethno-territorializing Bosnia, demanding greater rights for Croats and entrenching its grip on power in Croat-majority areas. It continues to enjoy robust backing from Croatia and its “mother party,” the HDZ led by Prime Minister Andrej Plenković. The state-level coalition formed after the last elections has since disintegrated, while the so-called Troika in the Federation has failed to live up to its initial promises and ambitions.
The European Union, for its part, has remained passive, reactive, and hesitant—partly constrained by certain member states such as Hungary and, more recently, Slovakia, both of which continue to shield Dodik politically. Overall, there is a pervasive sense that the EU has grown weary of Bosnia altogether, with officials in Brussels often responding to questions about the country with little more than a resigned shake of the head and the remark: “Ah, Bosnia again.”
The latest twist in Bosnia’s political landscape — dubbed the US “secret deal” with Dodik — saw the Republika Srpska Assembly withdraw several key pieces of anti-Bosnian and unconstitutional legislation, followed by Dodik’s long-overdue resignation. In return, however, he and his clientelist network of party and business allies were rewarded by being removed from the US sanctions list. To believe that a deal brokered by a transactional US administration could mark a sudden and transformative turn in Bosnia’s trajectory would be naïve. To hope that it might inspire a new, unified domestic effort toward EU-related reforms would be even more illusory.
Without a significant increase in the EU’s engagement, commitment, and pressure, there is little prospect of any genuine progress on Bosnia’s path to integration. As the country heads into a new cycle of general elections in 2026, the risk looms large that the next European Commission report — expected later that year — will once again be a non-event in a non-process.