Bulgaria's EU Membership Could Be Delayed by a Year

[Charlotte]

"The disgraceful Trakia highway deal could hamper Bulgaria's EU membership," Dutch-born MEP, Els de Groen warns in an interview for Standart.
"The granting of a concession for the Trakia highway without a bid or a tender is harmful for the Bulgarian nationals and it has nothing to do with EU regulations. Due to this, I will insist before the European Commission that it shows a red card to Bulgaria for its EU membership," Mrs. Els de Groen stated.
In de Groen's opinion, the legal proceedings connected with the Trakia highway deal only retard the outcome of the issue, so that the final judgment on the Trakia highway concession can be ruled after January, 1, 2007, when Bulgaria is expected to joint the EU.
"This scenario may fail, because Brussels is gravely concerned with the growing influence of the Ataka ultra nationalistic party and the high level of corruption in Bulgaria," Mrs. de Groen said further.
Mrs. de Groen also stated that the decision about Bulgaria's EU membership would not be made in June, as originally scheduled, but at the end of 2006.

www.standartnews.com

[Suzanne]

The Risk of Postponement of Bulgaria's EU Membership is Big

Conor Sweeney is the editor for Europe of Ireland's most popular newspaper The Irish Independent.
He has been working in Brussels for six years now, covering not only events related to the EU, but also some major events on the Continent

Q: Mr. Sweeney, could you please tell me what the Irish people know about Bulgaria in general?

A: Well, the people in Ireland do not know much about Bulgaria. Bulgaria has appeared in the headlines only once and it was when IRA tried to buy a Bulgarian bank, but even then the focus was on that the banks in Bulgaria were cheap, but not on that Bulgaria was a bad place to live in. At that time, there were also talks between Bulgarian and Irish ministers and Ireland's impression was that the Bulgarian authorities were complaisant and positively disposed towards their Irish colleagues. There was not even a trace of criticism towards the Bulgarian Government.

Q: According to you, will Bulgaria be acceded to the EU on January 1, 2007?

A: Frankly speaking, I do not quite know. The general opinion, shared in Brussels, is that Bulgaria and Romania are inseparably connected and that the two countries are quite unaware of how big is the risk of their accession into the Union to be postponed with a year. I think that what happened to Croatia - the country's negotiations for accession to the EU were delayed because of the inability of the authorities to deliver war criminal Ante Gotovina to The Hague, is quite instructive.
Now, Bulgaria and Romania are almost in the same position, in which the ten new members-states were just before entering the EU. They also had some problems to solve. Let's take Lithuania for example. Only a few months before the accession, they overthrew their President, because he allegedly had been a Russian secret agent and had had ties with criminal structures. Then, however, there were ten countries to be acceded and it was impossible the attention to be focused on one of them, whereas now the candidates for accession are only two and the further enlargement of the Union is regarded far more negatively.

Tsveti Nacheva
Reporter of Standart in Brussels
www.standartnews.com