Bulgaria and Romania to Join EU on Jan 1, Expanding Bloc to 27
By Jonathan Stearns
Sept. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Bulgaria and Romania received the go-ahead to join
the European Union on Jan. 1, winning billions of euros in subsidies and
expanding the world's largest trading bloc to 27 countries.
The European Commission said today Bulgaria and Romania upgraded regulatory
standards enough to avert a one-year entry delay. With a combined population
of 30 million, the two Balkan nations are counting on membership to help
raise per-capita wealth from a third of the EU average.
``Bulgaria and Romania have made further progress to complete their
preparations for membership,'' the commission, the 25-nation EU's executive
branch, said in Strasbourg, France. The commission reiterated the
possibility of curbing some entry benefits because food, aviation and
judicial norms still fall short.
The entry of Bulgaria and Romania will mark the EU's second expansion into
the former Soviet bloc to establish market-based rules for industries
ranging from energy and transport to telecommunications and banking. Ten
countries, including Poland and seven other nations in formerly communist
eastern Europe, joined in May 2004 and swelled the bloc's population to
about 460 million.
The January expansion will extend the EU's borders to the Black Sea, revive
a push to streamline European decision-making and put the spotlight on the
membership bids of other Balkan countries including Croatia, Turkey and
Macedonia. The entry goals of these nations are threatened by growing public
opposition in the EU to further enlargement.
Entry Negotiations
The prospect of EU membership has bolstered the Bulgarian and Romanian
economies. Last year, Romania's economy grew 4.1 percent to about $100
billion -- its sixth straight year of expansion --and the Bulgarian economy
grew 5.5 percent to about $24 billion in its eighth consecutive year of
expansion.
The two countries completed entry negotiations in 2004 and signed EU
accession treaties last year. Membership is slated to include EU subsidies
totaling 32 billion euros ($41 billion) for Romania and 11 billion euros for
Bulgaria through 2013.
``For Bulgaria this will be the final fall of the Berlin Wall,'' Bulgarian
Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev said in Sofia. ``This will justify all the
hardship of transition undergone by Bulgarians and the work of all Bulgarian
institutions to meet accession commitments.''
Because Bulgaria and Romania hadn't fully met European standards when the
accession treaties were signed, the EU reserved the right to delay entry by
12 months and deny both nations some membership benefits.
Entry Timetable
Sticking to the 2007 entry timetable ``is the best way of supporting
Bulgaria and Romania,'' said Hans-Gert Poettering, German head of the
European Parliament's Christian Democrats, the Strasbourg-based assembly's
biggest faction.
The EU may yet impose membership curbs because of lingering concerns about
judicial, food and financial standards in Romania and Bulgaria and aviation
norms in Bulgaria. Such restrictions could block some aid and market access.
The commission threatened to take ``remedial measures, where necessary, to
ensure the functioning of EU policies.''
Bulgaria's aviation standards have ``serious deficiencies,'' according to
the commission, which said it may ``restrict access to the internal aviation
market'' unless Bulgaria ``takes the necessary corrective actions.''
Corruption Fighting
Romania ranked 80th and Bulgaria 55th in a 2005 table of corrupt countries
compiled by Transparency International, a Berlin-based watchdog. Romania and
Bulgaria have had outbreaks of animal diseases including bird flu and swine
fever over the past year and the EU already bans some imports of poultry and
pork from the two nations.
``The current situation in both countries still requires the prohibition to
trade live pigs, pig meat, and certain pig meat products to the EU after
accession,'' the commission said.
In the field of justice, the commission said a possible restriction includes
suspending an obligation for member states to cooperate in civil and
criminal law with Bulgaria and Romania. This could deny the two countries
the chance to take part in the EU's fast-track extradition system.
Such EU-wide curbs would be drawn up and imposed by the commission. By
contrast, a membership delay would have required the commission to make a
recommendation for postponement and member states to approve it.
``Certain safeguard clauses will be proposed,'' said Martin Schulz, German
head of the EU Parliament's Socialists, the assembly's second-largest group.
``We still need to keep up the pressure in terms of reform.''
The prospect of restrictions highlights a public backlash over the entry of
poor countries. EU voter support for accepting more members has fallen below
50 percent over the past year, according to EU surveys released in July and
December.
``Europe has become so fragile because of enlargement,'' said Khalifa
Beltaief, a Strasbourg taxi driver who moved to France from Tunisia 32 years
ago and became a French national. ``The 10 new members were a lot to
integrate.''
French, Dutch
The enlargement concerns grew after French and Dutch voters last year
rejected a European constitution meant to help the bloc function better with
more members. Other aspiring members may be prevented from joining until the
EU rescues its new rule book, a process due to last at least until 2009.
``We can't continue enlarging again and again without clarifying the
institutional issue,'' Commission President Jose Barroso said yesterday in
Brussels.
Turkey and Croatia began accession talks last year, Macedonia wants the
go-ahead to start them and nations including Serbia and Montenegro are
seeking EU trade agreements that would be a stepping stone to membership.
The first institutional change resulting from next year's expansion will be
to increase by two from 25 the number of EU commissioners to make way for
appointees from Bulgaria and Romania. Each EU nation has the right to
appoint a commissioner.
Germany, France, Belgium and Denmark still need to ratify the accession
treaties with Bulgaria and Romania to remove the final obstacles to their
entry, according to the commission. The EU Parliament's Poettering said he
expects the four member states to accelerate the ratification procedures
following the commission's green light to 2007 entry.
-- With reporting by Elizabeth Konstantinova in Sofia and Bogdan Preda in
Bucharest. Editor: Costelloe
To contact the reporter on this story: Jonathan Stearns in Strasbourg,
France at <mailto:jstearns2@bloomberg.net> jstearns2@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: September 26, 2006 09:01 EDT
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