Messages in the Media - University of Toronto

BACKGROUND:
Over the past decade, Serbia’s future has become
increasingly locked into a path towards the EU. The relationship
has drastically changed since the fall of the Milosevic
regime in 2001. 1 In 2003, at the Thessaloniki Summit,
the EU made it clear that Serbia and the region’s future belongs
within the EU. 2 However, achieving candidate status
has proved to be more complicated than anticipated by the
Serbian government. Progress has been slow for much of
the past decade, but it has gained pace in recent years as
meeting EU criteria has become more effective. 3 Serbia
surpassed some substantial obstacles when it signed the
Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) in 2008, has
fulfilled all of its obligations to the ICTY by late 2011, and
has enacted some major reforms. 4 At the same time, there
have been disappointments for both sides.
Despite being recommended for candidate status
by the European Council on October 12, 2011, Serbia did
not achieve this by the end of the year as it had hoped. 5 Kosovo
remains a major issue and in December the European
Commission insisted that relations between the two must
be normalized before Serbia could receive candidate status.
6
MEDIA SOURCES:
Politika
www.politika.rs
This is the premier daily newspaper in the country, being
the oldest in the Balkans. 7 As such, it is considered to be the
newspaper of record and a leading authority in journalism.
It has a daily circulation of 135,000. 8
RTS (Radio Television of Serbia)
www.rts.rs
The national public broadcaster of Serbia whose daily news
program is the most watched in the country. 9 Since the end
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