Timeline of the relations with EU

More important events in the relations development between the Republic of Macedonia and the European Union:

• October 1992, the Republic of Macedonia appointed its representative in Brussels;

• December 22nd, 1995, the Republic of Macedonia and EU established diplomatic relations when EU opened negotiations with Republic of Macedonia aiming at signing the Agreement of wide ranging cooperation in the fields of the trade, financial operations and transport;

• March 10th, 1996, the Republic of Macedonia became a full partner in the PHARE Programme;

• June 20th, 1996, in Brussels, the Cooperation Agreement between the Republic of Macedonia and the European Communities and the Transport Agreement were concluded;

• March 21st and 22nd, 1998, in Skopje, the first meeting of the Common Cooperation Council was held. The Council was established for the purpose of monitoring realisation of the Cooperation Agreement, achievements and development of the structural reforms as well as providing suggestions and instructions relating to certain specific issues;

• January 24th, 2000, the European Commission Directives proposed to the EU Council were adopted, concerning the elevation of the cooperation level between the Republic of Macedonia and EU as well as commencing the official negotiations for prospective EU membership;

• April 5th, 2000, pursuant to the Lisbon Decision of the European Commission, the first round of negotiations between Republic of Macedonia and EU officially commenced relating to the SAА. Negotiations on the SAА were realised in significantly short period (April – November 2000) through 3 rounds of main negotiations and 5 meetings on expert level, i.e. technical negotiations;

• November 24th, 2000, on the margins of the Zagreb Summit the SAА was initialled;

• on 16 February 2001 Interim Agreement on Regulating SAA Trade Provisions was initialled;

• April 9th, 2001, in Luxemburg, the SAA  was signed. At the same time Interim Agreement on Trade and Trade-related Matters between the European Communities of the one part, and the Republic of Macedonia, of the other part was signed, entering into force on 1 June 2001;

• June 20th, 2003, the Member States leaders adopted ‘Thessaloniki Agenda for Western Balkans’, thus verifying the European perspective of the countries from the region. This document has defined the accession instruments in the stabilisation and association process;

• April 1st, 2004, following the ratification by all EU Member States, the Stabilisation and Association Agreement entered into force, so far the ninth cycle of meetings of institutional bodies established under SAA has been complited  ;

• March 22nd, 2004 on formal ceremony in Dublin, Republic of Ireland, the Government of the Republic of Macedonia submitted the application for EU membership;

• September 6th, 2004, the Government of the Republic of Macedonia adopted the National Strategy for European Integration;

• October 1st, 2004, the European Commission President, Romano Prodi submitted the Questionnaire to the Government of the Republic of Macedonia;

• February 14th, 2005 in Brussels, delegation of the Republic of Macedonia submitted to the European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, the Answers to the European Commission Questionnaire;

• November 9th, 2005, the European Commission published the opinion on the candidacy of the Republic of Macedonia for European Union membership. The opinion recommends granting candidate status for EU membership;

• December 17th, 2005, the Presidency of the European Council in Brussels granted candidate status to Macedonia for European Union membership;

• October 30th, 2007, Financial Agreement for 2007 National Programme within the Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance (IPA) and the Framework Agreement were signed between the Republic of Macedonia and the Commission of the European Communities on cooperation for financial assistance. The Republic of Macedonia was the first country in the region whose projects were approved by the EC and the first country in the region to sign the Financial Agreement thus enabling use of IPA funds;

• February, 2008, the Council adopted the Accession Partnership for Republic of Macedonia, identifying key priorities for progress and areas where efforts are required in the accession process;

• Since October, 2009 - Following the progress made in achieving full compliance with the Stabilisation and Association Agreement, the progress in fulfilling the political criteria, the progress in the implementation of the acquis, as well as the progress made regarding all areas covered by the visa liberalization dialogue, the European Commission has recommended start of the accession negotiations for full-fledged membership of the Republic of Macedonia;

• October, 2009- the Commission made a proposal on the transition to the second stage of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement;

• December, 2009 - In the framework of the visa liberalisation dialogue process, following the significant progress made in the areas of justice, freedom and security and the fulfilled roadmap benchmarks, the visa obligation for citizens of the Republic of Macedonia was lifted on 19 December 2009;

• March 15, 2012 - was created the High Level Accession Dialogue led by the Prime Minister of the Government of the Republic of Macedonia and the Commissioner for enlargement Stefan Fule. the dialogue brought dynamic in the reform process for accession to the European Union by strengthening confidence and increasing the European perspective of the country, and it is focused on the key challenges on these 5 areas: freedom of expression in media; rule of law, reform in public administration, electoral reform and strengthening of the trade economy. so far four meetings of the accession dialogue have been held.