2023-12-31 00:58:42
The Twenty-Seven unanimously approved this Saturday the gradual incorporation of Romania and Bulgaria into the Schengen area starting in March 2024. Entry has been possible after Austria chose to lift its veto. The decision allows the inclusion of the last two community countries that were not within the free movement of people treaty on a “historic day” that, according to the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, will mean “a big step for them.” and for the Schengen area.
The agreement was adopted in the last session under the current Spanish Presidency of the European Council. «Schengen grows! The Council of the EU has decided to extend the Schengen area to Bulgaria and Romania. Internal air and sea border controls will be lifted in March 2024, while the decision on the end of land controls will be made later,” he highlighted in a statement. The three countries mainly involved, Austria, Bulgaria and Romania, agreed to set this latest date during a series of meetings over the coming year.
The President of the European Commission stressed that it is “a day of great pride for Bulgaria and Romania.” She assured that the two countries “have worked hard for it” and both “deserve” membership. “They are going to make the Schengen area even stronger,” Von der Leyen concluded.
The president of the European Council, Charles Michel, also congratulated the governments of the two new members. “A long-awaited step for Romanian and Bulgarian citizens, who will enjoy easier freedom of movement with the prospect of it also being by land transport,” he noted on the social network X.
The European Commissioner for the Interior, Ylva Johansson, expressed her “warm welcome” to Romania and Bulgaria after a compromise that “breaks a thirteen-year stagnation. It is now essential to build on this achievement and ensure that free movement by land is also achieved next year. “I will continue to actively support the full access process in 2024,” she said.
The Romanian president, Klaus Iohannis, expressed his satisfaction with the lifting of the veto and considered his country’s incorporation into the treaty as “an important first step.” “Romania’s priority will be the full implementation of Schengen reaching the last phase, the elimination of ground controls,” he announced in his message, joined by the Prime Minister, Marcel Ciolacu, and the President of the Senate, Nicolae Ciuca. The prime minister regretted these last thirteen years “of failures and humiliations”, but congratulated himself because the Government is now beginning “an irreversible process. “Next year we will continue our efforts to definitively close this process.” The decision has been validated by written procedure communicated to the twenty-seven community capitals, according to Commission sources.
A long process
The process began a little over twelve years ago, with the support of the EU, which considered both countries to meet the necessary criteria to enter the Schengen area. In December 2022, the Twenty-seven tried again to close an agreement, but Austria and the Netherlands imposed their veto. It was a year later, after the intense negotiations in recent weeks between Bulgaria, Romania and Austria, that the final agreement was reached which, according to Spain, will facilitate the movement of people with a “positive” economic and social impact.
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