Romania’s Prime Minister, Ludovic
\nOrban, has underlined in Munich the legitimacy of Romania’s aspirations to join
\nthe Schengen Area as the country has long met all the technical accession
\ncriteria. The Romanian official attended the security conference in Munich
\nwhere he underlined the fact that ‘remaking the full functionality of the
\nSchengen Area is essential for ensuring the EU’s interior security. <\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
Pleading for a Europe open to
\nenlargement, the Romanian official went on to say that the EU must defend its
\nexternal borders, but not maintain interior borders. In an interview with Radio
\nRomania, Prime Ministers Orban has voiced conviction that the attitude of the
\nmember countries, which are opposing Romania’s access to Europe’s border-free
\narea, will change. <\/p>\n
\n
\n
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<\/p>\n
Ludovic Orban: I have
\npresented strong arguments in favour of accepting Romania’s presence in the
\nSchengen Area. We have met all the conditions to join this area and I am
\nconvinced the attitude of some countries will change.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
The Prime Minister, who voiced
\nopposition to the idea that Romania is not ready to join the border-free
\nSchengen Area due to corruption, has argued that Bucharest has proposed the
\nclosing down of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism on Justice by
\ncurbing corruption and increasing the independence of its judiciary. According
\nto the Romanian official, if the European funds are conditioned by the
\nsituation of the rule of law, legislation must have clear stipulations for all
\nthe member states in order to avoid unjust sanctions. <\/p>\n
\n
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<\/p>\n
Ludovic Orban: Being a domain, which can be subjected to
\nvarious subjective interpretations, regulations must be very clear, very
\nprecise, with a specific list of infringements on the second article of the
\nUnion Treaty and which are the sanctions to be imposed. And in this way any
\nsubjective interpretation will be avoided.<\/p>\n
\n
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<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Orban has also
\nreferred to Romania’s accession to the euro area. <\/p>\n
\n
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<\/p>\n
Ludovic Orban: There are
\nfive mandatory conditions that must be met. And the objective of the government
\nI lead is to meet these conditions and become part of the euro area. The
\ncountry’s EU integration will be completed after its accession to the euro
\narea. <\/p>\n
\n
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<\/p>\n
Although accession to euro zone has
\nbeen on the agenda of the governments in Bucharest for quite some time now, its
\ndeadline has been constantly pushed farther into the future since the country’s
\nEU entry in 2007. If the first deadline to join the area Romania set was 2012,
\nit seems that Bucharest will now have to wait until 2024 or 2026 to join the
\neuro-countries club. <\/p>\n
\n
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<\/p>\n
(translated by bill)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Romania should have joined the Schengen Area in 2011, but this has been repeatedly postponed due to opposition from some member countries, among which the Netherlands, Austria and Germany<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":84554,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[29120,29103,35648,31525,28976],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-84685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-eu","tag-euro","tag-ludovic","tag-orban","tag-schengen"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n