Bucharest/Sofia -- Bucharest and Sofia were set Sunday to celebrate the arrival of the New Year and - even more importantly - their accession to the European Union at the stroke of midnight.

Concerts, street celebrations and fireworks were also planned in many other cities as the people of both nations were finally able to celebrate a huge achievement after a decade and a half of hardship in the still ongoing transition from communist to free-market economies.

Despite being political opponents and contrary to earlier reports, Romania's President Traian Basescu and Prime Minister Calin Popescu Tariceanu are to celebrate their country's entry into the European Union together as the new year begins.

Tariceanu announced the plan during an interview broadcast on Romania's Realitatea TV Sunday.

Tariceanu told Realitatea TV that he and Basescu would accompany high-ranking official guests on the stage in Bucharest's Revolution Square to welcome the new year.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, EU Commissioner for Enlargement Olli Rehn and Bulgaria's top diplomat Ivaylo Kalfin were among the dignitaries expected on stage.

Earlier Sunday, Steinmeier and Rehn had visited the Transylvanian city of Sibiu in central Romania, which becomes European Capital of Culture on January 1 for one year.

"The accession of Romania and Bulgaria to the EU ends divisions in Europe," Rehn said in Sibiu and later in Bucharest. "With it the final remains of the Berlin Wall are removed."

Rehn said the EU enlargement process was "not an express train," but rather "sometimes also like a slow train," but it was important that the EU created momentum for reform in the west Balkan region.

Steinmeier said that Romania's accession was not second class and he wanted to recognize the country's "difficult, stony path" to EU entry.

Romania's accession was significant for the whole continent "because with it the still-open wound of the Cold War was closed" and a process ended "that had begun with German reunification," Steinmeier said at a meeting with his Romanian counterpart Mihai Razvan Ungureanu.

To mark the occasion, everyone was expected to dance a "round of integration" on the stage in Bucharest, Tariceanu said.

Originally it had been reported that Basescu would stay away from the official government celebrations so that he could attend a separate street festival on University Square.

Basescu and Tariceanu have been involved in a public power struggle for two years.

In Sofia, a privately-funded, 30-metre ballon with Bulgarian and EU flags surprised the people Sunday morning.

During the day, President Georgi Parvanov and Bulgaria's first EU commissioner, former European affairs minister Meglena Kouneva, were due to open the country's border to the EU at Koulata on the frontier with Greece.

Prime Minister Sergey Stanishev was set to celebrate in public in Sofia, and a special welcoming message to the Bulgarian nation from the president of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso, was due to be played on a giant screen downtown.

Some 40,000 people were expected to join the double street celebration in Sofia. EU and Bulgarian flags would be formally raised in a special ceremony starting in the early morning hours of Monday.

In Brussels, EU Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini sounded a note of caution Sunday, warning Bulgaria and Romania that further reforms of their police and justice services were expected.

Both countries had pledged to continue the modernization of their public prosecution authorities after joining the EU, the commissioner said, adding that he wanted to assist them and had set up cooperation and supervision procedures to do that.

Organized crime and corruption are major problems in the two Balkan countries, which now join Europol and Eurojust, Europe's police and justice authorities.

"This will allow the EU to expand and strengthen its policy of police and justice cooperation in the fight against organized crime and corruption," Frattini said in a statement issued in Brussels.

Bulgaria and Romania would now have to police a considerable portion of the EU's external borders and their full membership of the EU's border protection agency would help them in that, Frattini said.

The two countries were also receiving money from Brussels to prepare for their entry into the Schengen area, which has no internal border checks, Frattini said.

The accession of Romania and Bulgaria brings the number of EU nations to 27, with Croatia hoping to join in 2009 or 2010.

The western Balkan countries - Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Macedonia and Albania - are lagging behind on the path to EU membership. // © 2006 DPA




Publication date: 31 December 2006   

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