Curcic: Abolishing the right of veto in the EU would require amendments to the Union’s founding treaties

Petar Curcic, a researcher at the Institute for European Studies in Belgrade, believes that the abolition of the right of veto in the European Union will not occur, as it would require amendments to the EU’s founding treaties. He expects that most decisions will continue to be adopted by qualified majority, while other key decisions will remain within the competence of EU member states.

Commenting on a statement by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban that the European People’s Party has adopted a strategy aimed at stripping EU member states of their veto rights, Curcic told Kosovo Online that the right of veto has largely been relativized, given the system of qualified majority voting, which currently requires at least 15 out of 27 member states representing at least 65 percent of the EU population to vote in favor of a decision.

“We can say that most decisions are already adopted by qualified majority. In these EU reforms that are often mentioned, both France and Germany have taken the lead, depending on the phase. Germany has proposed abolishing the right of veto and introducing the principle of qualified majority. Some parties have, of course, insisted on this even more strongly,” Curcic noted.

However, he points out that abolishing the right of veto would require amendments to the founding treaties of the European Union, which is why he does not expect such a reform to take place. Instead, he believes that most decisions will continue to be made by qualified majority, while other key decisions will remain within the competence of EU member states.

Curcic also noted that candidate countries in the region have disagreements with certain member states and that there is a group of countries blocking enlargement.

“We always have a country or a group of countries that block the enlargement process. We see in the case of Macedonia and Montenegro - Montenegro has tensions in relations with Zagreb, while Macedonia has problems with Bulgaria and previously had problems with Greece. Serbia, on the other hand, due to its political relations and its failure to impose sanctions on Russia, faces consequences in its relations with the Baltic states, Poland, and the Scandinavian countries, and Croatia is also frequently mentioned,” Curcic explained.

Regarding the potential accession to the EU without veto rights, he reiterated that such changes would require amendments to the founding treaties.

“There is also this other measure, which concerns introducing a form of membership that does not include participation in decision-making, and we will see what happens with that. For all such types of decisions, you must revise the founding treaties, and in order to revise them, all countries must agree, so this is a process that is very far off, and I think the most realistic outcome is that the current scenario will remain,” Curcic concluded.