The Birth of “EU Light”

Focus English News

"The Birth of “EU Light”

6 April 2006 | 21:36
Der Standard

Romania and Bulgaria will become the first EU member states that have more limited rights. It doesn’t matter when exactly they will join the EU – in 2007 or 2008, because behind the numerous formulations and safeguard clauses about the shortening of certain deadlines under the accession treaty, there is a simple exclusion of EU member states from the market of agrarian products or the economic “core” of the union, from the common market and the related right of votes – by the time the countries implement the EU membership criteria. With a view to that, the EU will have to give up the idea that it is a union of states with equal rights and obligations, in which the full-fledged membership is a priority of the states. A state that has joined the EU gives the European Commission, the European Council and the European Parliament governing opportunities, and the thought that the attempt at implementing even a project of a larger scale, such as the accession of Turkey, is becoming more and more clearer. In the meantime, the so-called “EU Light” is a step backwards from the political union toward the direction of a more liberalized economic cooperation."