Former Yugoslav republics on the road to EU

(BELGRADE) - EU foreign ministers are to decide Tuesday whether to allow Serbia to officially become a candidate for membership of the 27-nation bloc. Here is a chrono of former Yugoslav republics on the road to the EU.

June 1991: Croatia and Slovenia officially declare independence from the Yugoslav Federation, triggering the collapse of the former Yugoslavia. The break-up was followed by a series of bloody wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo during the 1990s.

March 1998: Slovenia starts membership talks, the first former Yugoslav republic to do so.

May 1, 2004: Slovenia is among the 10 new countries joining the EU in the bloc's biggest-ever expansion along with Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland and Slovakia.

October 2005: Some 10 years after the end of the 1991-1995 war Croatia starts EU membership talks.

November 2005: Macedonia gets EU candidacy status, but membership talks have not yet started because Greece is blocking them over a decades-long name dispute.

December 2010: Montenegro is granted candidacy status but no date for the start of membership talks is set.

December 9, 2011: Croatia signs an EU accession treaty, paving the way for the former Yugoslav republic to join the bloc in mid-2013.

EU leaders delay a decision on giving Serbia candidate status until March, 2012. They also say Montenegro could open accession talks on June 2012 if it meets certain conditions related to fighting organised crime and corruption.

February 28, 2012: EU foreign ministers are due to decide whether they accept Serbia as a candidate member.

Bosnia-Hercegovina and Kosovo are the only former Yugoslav territories that have not yet formally applied to join the EU but their leaders made it clear that they intend to do so in the future.