The Paris-based intergovernmental Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said on Tuesday that they have started membership negotiations with Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Croatia, Peru, and Romania.

The organization, which has 38 full member countries, was founded in 1961, and works to promote democracy and market economy around the world. The six countries who started their negotiations on Tuesday have been under consideration to join the

“OECD membership remains the most direct and effective way to ensure the adoption and dissemination of our shared values, principles and standards across the world,” OECD Secretary-General, Mathias Cormann, was cited as saying in a press release. “Candidate countries will be able to use the accession process to promote further reforms for the benefit of their people, while also strengthening the OECD as a like-minded community committed to a rules-based international order,” he added.

The OECD said they will now consider roadmaps for each country which will set out the terms, conditions, and the process for accession.There is no deadline for the process. “The process will include a rigorous and in-depth evaluation by more than 20 technical committees, of the candidate country’s alignment with OECD standards, policies and practices,” the organization said.

Prime Minister, Andrej Plenkovic, commented on the decision in a tweet. “Croatia is ready to start OECD membership negotiations. Besides the Schengen Area and the euro zone, our priority is OECD membership which will help strengthen our economy as well as Croatia’s international standing and influence,” Plenkovic said.

Croatia has been trying to join the OECD for years, but according to local media reports its membership negotiations had been blocked several times by member countries – first by Hungary, over Zagreb’s decision to ignore the UNCITRAL arbitration in a long-running dispute involving Croatia’s oil company Ina and Hungary’s Mol.

The latter had acquired a stake at Ina more than a decade ago, and later took control of the company via an agreement with former Prime Minister and leader of Plenkovic’s party HDZ, Ivo Sanader. Croatian authorities continue to claim that Sanader – now jailed over a number of corruption scandals – was bribed by Mol.

Former foreign minister, Marija Pejcinovic-Buric, said in November 2018 that Hungary had dropped its opposition to Croatia’s membership, although she did not offer any explanation for the move. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Plenkovic announced in December 2021 that Croatia would seek to overturn the arbitration ruling once again, after Croatia’s Supreme Court had ruled that Sanader had in fact taken bribe.

Croatia’s membership was also blocked by Slovenia over their border dispute arbitration from 2017, which Slovenia recognizes but Croatia does not. Local media also reported that the US is also not too keen on accepting Croatia’s membership bid, and speculated that reasons could be found in some of the long-running problems listed in regular reports compiled by the State Department, which include the return of private-held property to Jews and other minorities taken from them during and after WW2, which has been practically put on hold since 2014.

Other problems cited involve the normalization of the downplaying of WW2 crimes committed by the Croatia’s wartime fascist regime by right-wing figures, the government’s inability to tackle corruption, the lack of transparency in media ownership, and LGBT rights.