Partial Schengen accession
Entry to Bulgaria and Romania relaxed
Bulgaria and Romania partially joined the European Schengen area on Sunday. Since midnight (local time, 11 p.m. CET), entry controls at airports and in shipping have been lifted. Travelers from the two countries no longer have to fly to other EU countries via international terminals.
At land borders, however, the authorities will continue to check identity documents. This affects car and truck drivers who travel to Romania or Bulgaria via Hungary or Greece, for example. As reported, the EU states agreed on the partial accession of the two countries to the Schengen area at the end of December.
Veto by Austria
Austria's government is particularly opposed to the complete abolition of land border controls. It justifies this with the high number of irregular entries via the Balkan route. At the beginning of March, Chancellor Nehammer (ÖVP) said at a meeting with Romania's President Johannis in Bucharest that there was still "no concrete timetable" for full admission to the Schengen area.
29 countries member
"The decision on the extension to land borders will be political", said Romanian Interior Minister Catalin Predoiu on Sunday. "Full implementation (of Schengen, note)" could not be postponed for much longer, he said. Bulgarian Prime Minister Nikolai Denkov spoke of a "great success". According to him, full accession could come after the EU elections or the national elections in Austria.
The Schengen area is intended to guarantee the unrestricted movement of people in Europe. 25 of the 27 EU member states are part of it, as well as Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. Romania and Bulgaria had been waiting to join since 2011.
Kommentare
Liebe Leserin, lieber Leser,
die Kommentarfunktion steht Ihnen ab 6 Uhr wieder wie gewohnt zur Verfügung.
Mit freundlichen Grüßen
das krone.at-Team
User-Beiträge geben nicht notwendigerweise die Meinung des Betreibers/der Redaktion bzw. von Krone Multimedia (KMM) wieder. In diesem Sinne distanziert sich die Redaktion/der Betreiber von den Inhalten in diesem Diskussionsforum. KMM behält sich insbesondere vor, gegen geltendes Recht verstoßende, den guten Sitten oder der Netiquette widersprechende bzw. dem Ansehen von KMM zuwiderlaufende Beiträge zu löschen, diesbezüglichen Schadenersatz gegenüber dem betreffenden User geltend zu machen, die Nutzer-Daten zu Zwecken der Rechtsverfolgung zu verwenden und strafrechtlich relevante Beiträge zur Anzeige zu bringen (siehe auch AGB). Hier können Sie das Community-Team via unserer Melde- und Abhilfestelle kontaktieren.