EU: Bulgaria and Romania have significantly advanced their preparations for membership of the European Union over the last year, putting them on course potentially to join in 2007, EU leaders said yesterday.
"Welcoming Bulgaria and Romania in January 2007 as members of the Union, if they are ready, is the common objective of the Union of 25," the leaders said in a statement issued at a summit in Brussels.
Ten mostly ex-Soviet central European countries are due to join the existing 15 EU member- states in May.
The leaders said they would do everything to facilitate that timeline, apparently rebutting suggestions by diplomats that the accession of the two south-east European countries might be delayed because of Romania's relative backwardness and to wait for Croatia, which has applied for membership, to catch up.
Both Romania and Bulgaria completed essential reforms to prepare for membership and the EU's enlargement commissioner said on Tuesday that it was realistic they would join in 2007.
"The European Union is very serious in its promise that the present round of enlargement. . . will only be completed when Bulgaria and Romania join the European Union in 2007," the EU's Commissioner for Enlargement, Mr Guenter Verheugen, told a news conference.
"I think it is a very realistic assumption that Bulgaria will join on January 1st, 2007, very realistic," he said.
He added that he was equally confident Romania would be ready. - (Reuters)