Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic said on Wednesday that she would refuse European membership for Serbia if it were offered today.

Speaking at a European Policy Centre event in Brussels, Brnabic said that more needs to be done before Serbia joined the EU. 

“If the EU offered enlargement to Serbia today, I would say no. We need to do more ourselves first,” she said.  

The prime minister said that the 2025 deadline for Serbia to join the EU was very ambitious, adding that it depended not only on Serbia but on the EU and its member states as well.  

"If the #EU offered enlargement to #Serbia today, I would say no." says Prime Minister @anabrnabic. "We need to do more ourselves first."

— EuropeanPolicyCentre (@epc_eu) December 19, 2018

According to Brnabic, the EU was right to shape enlargement in a way that makes the Balkans a more stable and integrated region.  

The Serbian prime minister said that the Balkans have to show understanding for the challenges facing the EU.

“Serbia got it right in understanding Europe as a family of values and a peace project. For me, Europe is a set of values, not a pot of money,” she said.

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