Bulgaria and Romania to join EU in 2007
Sep 26 9:19 AM US/Eastern
The European Commission has given Bulgaria and Romania the green light to join the European Union in January, but with the closest monitoring system ever imposed on new members.
The 26th and 27th members of the European club will be allowed to join up on January 1, 2007, EU Commission President Jose Manuel Durao Barroso announced at an EU parliamentary plenary session in Strasbourg on Tuesday.
While the EU's executive arm decided that the two countries have made sufficient reforms to be allowed to enter the club, both still need to work harder to overcome corruption, organised crime, and ensure the proper use of EU funds and food safety.
"Bulgaria and Romania have carried out an extraordinary reform process and they have gone through a remarkable transformation," the European Commission said in a statement.
"However, there are still a limited number of areas where further progress is needed in the months leading to accession and beyond."
The "safeguard mechanisms of last resort" may be applied up to three years after they join.
They include the possibility of withholding EU funding, the temporary suspension of EU rights, banning the sale of unsafe food and the non-recognition of certain civil and criminal judgements or arrest warrants.
Swine fever in both countries means a pork import ban will be maintained.
Both new member states will have to make an initial report to the Commission on the benchmarks that are to be fulfilled by March 31, 2007.
Amid weakening support in some EU states for further enlargement and fears of a flood of new job-seeking migrants, most member states are expected to impose restrictions to workers from the two newcomers, as they did when 10 mainly former Soviet-bloc countries joined in 2004.
Britain, which allowed unrestricted access last time, has warned that it is likely to put a cap on immigrants from Bulgaria and Romania, after half a million east Europeans flooded the country since the EU's big wave of expansion on May 1, 2004.
On the eve of the announcement at a European Parliament session here, commission president Jose Manuel Barroso said further enlargement should be frozen until EU member states decide on reforms to streamline decision-making.
"It would be inadvisable to have any more member states in the union, apart from Romania and Bulgaria, before sorting out the institutional question," Barroso said.
Croatia, which aims to join the EU in 2009, would likely be the first to feel the affects of any enlargement freeze, although Barroso said Monday he would like to see the former Yugoslav state join the bloc as soon as possible.
The stunning 'no' votes in French and Dutch referendums last year scuppered plans to introduce an EU constitution, aimed at facilitating decision-making in the increasingly disparate group of countries.
Bulgaria and Romania will be among the poorest members of the EU, making up six percent of the bloc's population but less than one percent of its gross domestic product (GDP).
In both countries, GDP per head is about a third of the EU average, but growing rapidly for the 22 million Romanians and eight million Bulgarians.
Adding Bulgaria and Romania to the European club will give the EU a new neighbour, Moldova; access to the Black Sea; an increase of its border with Turkey and some 30 million new inhabitants, bringing the total to some 457 million Europeans.
Bulgaria and Romania to join EU in 2007
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