News: Von der Leyen, State of the Union Address: "Speeding up the enlargement process also through the amendment of the founding Treaties"

The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, gave the traditional "State of the Union Address" before the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

The President began her speech by recalling the next great event, that of the European elections, in which voters and institutions will have to deal with the great challenges represented by a war at the gates of Europe, the fight against climate change and the future use of AI. In this contest, continues von der Leyen, the European Union must prove capable of answering the "call of history".

The European enlargement was one of the big issues: after declaring that "the future of the Western Balkans is in our Union", the President reiterates that "accession is merit-based" and, after applauding the determination with which the candidate states have faced the required reforms, has sanctioned the need for the European Union to "move past old, binary debates about enlargement". The President then called for the necessary reforms to accelerate the accession process, including through the amendment of the founding treaties, if necessary.

The President concluded by announcing that the Commission will start working on a series of pre-enlargement policy reviews “to see how each area may need to be adapted to a larger Union”.

Credits photo: https://www.flickr.com/photos/european_parliament/53188721191/