Romania
\ncould soon get the green light for its long awaited accession to Schengen. The
\nissue of Romania and Bulgaria’s accession to Europe’s border-free area could be
\nincluded on the agenda of the Justice and Home Affairs Council over 8-9
\nDecember. The final decision on the enlargement is to be made by the EU
\nmembers, which are part of the Schengen zone, and only the Netherlands, which
\nhas constantly opposed Romania’s accession, has again proved reluctant. <\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Authorities
\nin the Hague say that in principle they do not oppose Romania’s accession, but
\nthe Dutch Parliament has recently recommended that no irreversible decision be
\nmade without additional verifications. A voluntary assessment mission has this
\nmonth come to Romania and Bulgaria and experts of the European Commission and
\nthe member states have submitted their report to the working group for Schengen.
\n<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The
\nNetherlands didn’t send its experts with the mission, which according to
\nRomania’s Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca, has ended with conclusions as positive
\nas possible. Ciuca says he hasn’t read the report, which hasn’t been published
\nyet, but got the good news from the Romanian representatives who participated
\nin its analysis. The report ‘confirms Romania’s preparation for the Schengen
\nacquis and brings us closer to reaching this country objective’, Prime Minister
\nCiuca says. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Accompanied
\nby the Interior and Justice Ministers, the head of the Romanian executive has
\nthis week flown to Brussels, where he got assurances that Romania benefits from
\nfull support for its accession to Schngen. All the European officials, Ciuca
\ntalked to during his two-day visit, say the same thing. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Nicolae Ciuc\u0103: We
\nhave proved that we can protect the EU’s external borders. We did that even
\nbefore the beginning of the conflict and focused even more on the issue after
\nits commencement. And the pressure on the border personnel was as complex and
\ndynamic as it could possibly be.<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Romania’s
\nresults have been appreciated in Brussels and that is also visible in the
\nnon-legislative resolution recently passed by the European Parliament with a
\nlandslide majority, which calls on the EU Council to take all the necessary
\nmeasures to endorse a decision by the end of the year on Romania and Bulgaria’s
\nentry into Schengen. We have also received positive signals regarding the
\nlifting of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) and the Prime Minister
\nhas mentioned the talks he had in this respect with the president of the
\nEuropean Commission Ursula von der Leyen while the Justice Minister Catalin
\nPredoiu held applied technical talks with other European officials. <\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The
\nPrime Minister has mentioned the stage in the process of endorsing the new
\njustice laws, underlining that the progress in the past months may serve as a
\ngood basis for a positive CVM report from the European Commission. During his
\nvisit to Brussels Ciuca told the Romanian MEPs that joint action is needed
\nconcerning both the country’s accession to Schengen and having the Cooperation
\nand Verification Mechanism lifted.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
(bill)<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Romania enjoys the full support from Brussels for its accession to Schengen. There are also positive signals regarding the lifting of the Mechanism for Cooperation and Verification<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":108,"featured_media":93594,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[29174,40701,29120,35117,19347,28976,36458],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-93593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-bulgaria","tag-entry","tag-eu","tag-leyen","tag-romania","tag-schengen","tag-ursula"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n