After voting for independence from Serbia and Montenegro in 2006, Montenegro began the process of accession to the European Union by agreeing to a Stabilisation and Association Agreement with the EU, which officially came into force on 1 May 2010. Montenegro officially applied to join the EU on 15 December 2008. Membership negotiations began on 29 June 2012.[1] As of 2024, Montenegro's goal is to achieve membership of the EU by 2028.[2][3]
It is one of nine current EU candidate countries, together with Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Moldova, North Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey, and Ukraine. Among the six candidates with open negotiations (Montenegro, Serbia, Albania, North Macedonia, Moldova and Ukraine), the most advanced stage of the negotiations—defined as meeting the interim benchmarks for negotiation chapter 23 and 24 which allow the closing process of all negotiation chapters to start—has so far only been reached by Montenegro.[4] As of September 2024, thirty out of 33 chapters remain to be closed.