Reports from the European Union summit in Brussels say EU leaders are expected to postpone until next spring a decision on whether Serbia can become an official candidate for membership in the bloc.

A decision had originally been expected to be announced on December 9. But reports quote a draft statement from the summit as saying a decision on Serbia's EU candidacy has now been pushed back to at least the EU summit scheduled for March.

The reports quote the draft as saying the EU will be checking to see if Serbia has "continued to show credible commitment and achieved further progress in moving forward with the implementation in good faith of agreements" with the ethnic Albanian leadership of Kosovo, the former Serbian territory.

Kosovo’s independence has been recognized by most of the 27 EU member states, but not by Serbia.

Ahead of the Brussels summit, Serbia's EU candidacy was troubled over issues including clashes this year between Kosovo Serbs, Kosovo police and NATO peacekeepers in northern Kosovo, near the Serbian border.

Reports say Germany, in particular, was vehemently opposed to granting Serbia candidate status at the current time.

In other Balkans developments at the EU summit in Brussels, Croatia on December 9 was expected to sign its accession treaty with the EU.

Croatia is expected to become the EU's 28th member in 2013, after all 27 other member states ratify the accession treaty.

And Montenegro along with its coastline the EU needs was expected to receive approval to open its EU accession negotiations next year.