Where will the South-East European Cooperation Process Summit take place?

The summit will be held in Sofia, BGR.

What is a key outcome of the summit?

A key outcome of the summit is the transfer of the SEECP presidency, which will occur in Sofia, BGR.

South-East European Cooperation Process Summit 2026

Name: South-East European Cooperation Process Summit 2026
Start: 2026-06-10T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-06-10T00:00:00Z
Location: Sofia

Jun 10, 2026Sofia, BulgariaIn-person

Registration open

The South-East European Cooperation Process (SEECP) Summit is scheduled to take place in Sofia, Bulgaria. This event marks a significant moment for regional cooperation, as it is where the presidency of the SEECP will transition. The summit serves as a platform for leaders from participating countries to discuss ongoing regional issues and to strategize for future collaborative efforts.

Committees & topics

Topics
Regional Cooperation in South-East Europe · Stability in the Western Balkans · Security in South-East Europe · Sustainability and the Green Transition · European Integration of South-East Europe · Economic Development and the Common Regional Market · Regional Connectivity: Transport, Energy, and Digital · Hybrid Threats and Foreign Malign Influence

Why it matters

The SEECP Summit holds considerable importance for the stability and development of the South-East European region. The transfer of the SEECP presidency signifies a rotating leadership, ensuring that different national perspectives guide the organization's agenda and priorities. This rotational aspect is crucial for fostering a sense of shared ownership and responsibility among member states.

The summit provides a critical forum for diplomatic engagement, allowing leaders to address common challenges such as economic development, security, and regional integration. The discussions and agreements reached at this event can have lasting impacts on the political and economic landscape of the area. Understanding the dynamics at play, including the various national interests and potential areas of cooperation, is essential for anyone seeking to comprehend the complexities of South-East European geopolitics.

How to prepare

To effectively analyze the SEECP Summit, it is crucial to conduct thorough research into the current political and economic climates of the participating nations. This includes understanding the specific interests and potential points of contention among nations in the region. A useful approach involves applying the principles of a "Stakeholder Mapping Workshop" to identify key actors and their motivations.

Consider how the rotating presidency might influence the summit's agenda. Each presiding nation typically brings its own set of priorities and perspectives, which can shift the focus of regional discussions. Understanding these shifts requires a "Dynamic Analysis" of the organization's historical trajectory and the current geopolitical context. Furthermore, identifying "Hidden Stakeholders" beyond the obvious governmental representatives can provide a more nuanced understanding of the forces shaping regional cooperation.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 2 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Bulgaria

Host nation, facilitating the summit and the transfer of the SEECP presidency.

Role in topic

As the host city, Sofia, BGR, plays a central role in organizing the summit and ensuring its smooth execution. This position offers BGR a unique opportunity to shape the logistical and diplomatic environment of the event, influencing the tone and flow of discussions among regional leaders.

Romania

Assumes the SEECP presidency, setting the agenda for the upcoming term.

Role in topic

ROU is poised to take over the presidency of the South-East European Cooperation Process. This leadership role grants ROU the responsibility to guide the organization's work, set strategic priorities, and foster regional cooperation in the period following the summit.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

Regional Cooperation in South-East Europe

The South-East European Cooperation Process (SEECP) was launched in 1996 in Sofia as the only genuinely indigenous forum for political dialogue in the Balkans, complementing externally-driven initiatives such as the Royaumont Process and the Stability Pact. Born in the shadow of the Yugoslav wars, its founding premise was that lasting reconciliation required ownership by the region itself rather than imposition from Brussels, Washington, or Moscow. Over three decades it has expanded from a handful of post-Yugoslav and neighbouring states to thirteen participants and gained an institutional arm in the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC), headquartered in Sarajevo since 2008. Cooperation today spans trade (CEFTA 2006), transport, energy, education mobility, and justice and home affairs, increasingly bundled under the Common Regional Market agenda endorsed in Sofia in 2020. Yet progress remains uneven: unresolved bilateral disputes — the Belgrade–Pristina dialogue, the North Macedonia–Bulgaria identity quarrel, and Bosnia and Herzegovina's internal blockages — repeatedly stall regional projects. The SEECP chairmanship-in-office rotates annually and serves as the political compass for setting priorities that the RCC then operationalises.

Key players

Stability in the Western Balkans

Stability in South-East Europe rests on a fragile post-conflict architecture built around the Dayton Accords (1995), UN Security Council Resolution 1244 (1999), the Ohrid Framework Agreement (2001), and the Prespa Agreement (2018). While large-scale interstate war has been absent for a quarter-century, low-intensity political crises recur: ethnic-Serb withdrawal from Kosovo's institutions and the September 2023 Banjska incident, persistent secessionist rhetoric from Republika Srpska, and protracted government formation in several states. The Office of the High Representative in Bosnia and KFOR's continued presence in Kosovo testify to how much external scaffolding still underpins domestic stability. Demographic decline, brain drain, captured institutions, and the weaponisation of historical grievances by political elites complicate consolidation. Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 sharpened the divide between SEECP participants over alignment with EU sanctions and brought renewed attention to malign influence operations. Recent EU initiatives — the Growth Plan for the Western Balkans (2023) and reinvigorated enlargement signals — are explicitly framed as stability instruments, conditioning funding on rule-of-law and good-neighbourly relations.

Key players

Security in South-East Europe

South-East Europe sits at the intersection of NATO's south-eastern flank, the Black Sea theatre, and the Eastern Mediterranean. Following waves of NATO enlargement — Greece and Turkey (1952), Romania and Bulgaria (2004), Albania and Croatia (2009), Montenegro (2017), and North Macedonia (2020) — most SEECP participants are now Allies, though Serbia maintains military neutrality and Bosnia and Kosovo remain outside the Alliance. EUFOR Althea in Bosnia and KFOR in Kosovo retain Chapter VII mandates, and the Bucharest Nine format has become a key consultative venue since 2022. Russia's war in Ukraine reshaped regional threat perceptions: Black Sea littoral security, mine drift, GPS jamming, and energy infrastructure protection have moved to the top of national agendas. Non-traditional threats — organised crime networks trafficking arms and people through the Balkan route, returning foreign fighters, and the diversion of small arms and light weapons — remain entrenched legacies of the 1990s that the SEESAC mechanism continues to address. Defence spending across the region has risen sharply, with most members now meeting or approaching the 2% of GDP NATO benchmark.

Key players

Sustainability and the Green Transition

South-East Europe remains one of Europe's most carbon-intensive subregions, with lignite-fired power dominating the electricity mix in Serbia, Bosnia, Kosovo, and North Macedonia, and several of the continent's most polluted cities concentrated in the Western Balkans. The Energy Community Treaty (in force since 2006) extends parts of the EU energy acquis to non-EU participants, and the Sofia Declaration on the Green Agenda for the Western Balkans (2020) committed signatories to align with the European Green Deal, including a regional carbon pricing trajectory. The EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, with full charges from 2026, has made decarbonisation an urgent economic question, not just an environmental one. Climate vulnerability is acute: the 2014 and 2023 floods, recurrent Adriatic and Aegean heatwaves, wildfires, and Danube and Sava basin droughts have caused billions in damages. Cross-border water management (Drin, Sava, Vardar/Axios basins), biodiversity loss in remaining free-flowing rivers, and air-quality cooperation are recurrent SEECP/RCC themes. Just-transition financing — particularly for coal-dependent regions — and access to EU instruments such as the Modernisation Fund and Growth Plan funds frame the current debate.

Key players

European Integration of South-East Europe

EU enlargement to the region began with Greece (1981), continued with Slovenia (2004), Bulgaria and Romania (2007), and Croatia (2013), and has since slowed. The 2003 Thessaloniki Summit affirmed that the Western Balkans' future lies within the EU, but two decades on, accession remains protracted: Montenegro and Serbia opened negotiations in 2012 and 2014, North Macedonia and Albania only in 2022 after years of bilateral vetoes, Bosnia obtained candidate status in 2022 and opened talks in 2024, and Kosovo's status remains contested with five EU non-recognisers. Turkey's accession process, opened in 2005, is effectively frozen. Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine prompted a geopolitical reawakening of enlargement, embodied in the 2023 Growth Plan for the Western Balkans, which front-loads €6 billion linked to reforms and integration into the EU single market. The new methodology emphasises reversibility, fundamentals-first sequencing (rule of law, public administration, economic governance), and gradual integration ahead of full membership. Persistent bilateral disputes, democratic backsliding, and enlargement fatigue within the EU itself remain the principal obstacles.

Key players

Economic Development and the Common Regional Market

South-East European economies have converged with EU averages unevenly: Slovenia, Croatia, Greece, Romania, and Bulgaria are EU members with full single-market access, while the Western Balkan Six together form a market of roughly 17 million people with combined GDP smaller than that of many individual EU states. Intra-regional trade has grown under CEFTA 2006 but remains below potential, hampered by non-tariff barriers, weak transport links, and limited mutual recognition. Remittances exceed 10% of GDP in several economies, and labour emigration — particularly of skilled workers — has become a structural drag on growth. The Common Regional Market Action Plan (2021–2024) and its successor framework, alongside the EU Growth Plan, aim to extend four-freedoms-style integration ahead of accession through mutual recognition of professional qualifications, roaming-like arrangements, and SEPA inclusion. Foreign direct investment patterns are diversifying, with substantial Chinese involvement in infrastructure, Gulf capital in real estate and tourism, and renewed Western interest in critical raw materials (notably Serbia's Jadar lithium project). Inflation shocks since 2022 and energy price volatility have tested fiscal space across the region.

Key players

Regional Connectivity: Transport, Energy, and Digital

Connectivity has been a flagship SEECP/RCC theme since the 2014 Berlin Process launched the Connectivity Agenda, channelling EU and IFI investment into Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) extensions to the Western Balkans. Priority corridors — Corridor VIII (Adriatic to Black Sea), Corridor X (Salzburg–Thessaloniki), and the Niš–Pristina–Durrës axis — remain partially completed. Energy connectivity advanced with the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (2020), the Greece–Bulgaria Interconnector (2022), and ongoing electricity market coupling under the Energy Community, reducing but not eliminating dependence on Russian gas. Digital connectivity has progressed faster than physical infrastructure: regional roaming charges were abolished in 2021 among the Western Balkan Six and reduced with the EU from 2023; cross-border data flows and e-identification interoperability are being negotiated. Competing geoeconomic offers — the EU's Global Gateway, China's Belt and Road (notably the Budapest–Belgrade railway and Bar–Boljare highway), and Turkish construction conglomerates — frame the strategic dimension of connectivity, with debt sustainability and procurement transparency recurrent concerns.

Key players

Hybrid Threats and Foreign Malign Influence

South-East Europe has become a laboratory for hybrid activity: disinformation campaigns amplifying ethnic grievances, cyber operations against electoral and energy infrastructure, instrumentalisation of religious and diaspora networks, and economic coercion through energy and credit dependencies. The 2016 alleged coup attempt in Montenegro, repeated cyberattacks on Albanian government systems attributed to Iran in 2022, GPS jamming over the Black Sea, and sustained Russian and Serbian-language information operations around the Kosovo and Bosnia dossiers exemplify the spectrum. Responses are converging around EU and NATO frameworks: the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats (Helsinki), NATO's Hybrid CoE engagement, the EU's Digital Services Act and Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) toolbox, and bilateral cyber assistance from the United States and EU member states. The RCC's South-East European Common Information Space initiative and growing national StratCom capacities reflect attempts to build regional resilience, but uneven institutional capacity, media capture, and politicised public broadcasters limit effectiveness.

Key players