The Romanian government is now calling out for a high-level, extraordinary EU meeting of various leaders including the European Union President and European Commission President to discuss the recent rejection of the Eastern European nation and its fellow nation of Bulgaria from entering the Schengen Zone. Romania’s Prime Minister Mihai Răzvan Ungureanu has already begun talks with EU officials.
It was primarily Finland and the Netherlands that had become obstacles for the two fledgling EU nation members during the meeting of the EU interior ministers on the premise that there were doubts about how both countries handled corruption, organized crime and other problems which could prove “fatal” to the stability of other member states in the free-visa Schengen Zone.
The rejected countries of Bulgaria and Romania responded in the same vein: anger and frustration.
Bulgaria’s Interior Minister Tsvetanov turned sour and angry at the news of the rejection and further delay while Romania’s Foreign Minister Baconschi merely stated that his country will again attempt to convince the two countries in the way of its entry into the Schengen Zone.
Also after the rejection, Romania began halting its imports of flowers and other plants from the Netherlands citing that the paperwork for imports was not in order and that imports have potentially have “dangerous bacteria”.
The Dutch of course, did not take kindly to the “cheap move”.
Prime Minister Ungureanu told reporters in the capital of Bucharest that the country
“asks for fair treatment because such ‘extremist behavior’ puts the integration process on hold… I think we need an extraordinary European Council to discuss very honestly what’s going on, how we can react to support pro-European policies.”
The Schengen Zone was created following the Schengen Agreement in 1985 which involved only five signatories: Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, France and the former West Germany.
Since 1985, the Schengen Zone has grown to include twenty two of the twenty seven existing European Union member states along with other countries such as Switzerland.
To gain entry into the Schengen Zone, the country must receive a unanimous vote from existing members.
Some countries, such as Poland, are siding with Bulgaria and Romania arguing that their entries into the Schengen Zone have been long promised.
It is expected that Poland along with Denmark and others who support Romania and Bulgaria will bring up this issue once more in the upcoming October summit in the city of Brussels.
(Cover Photo: BGNES)
