Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă and Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu held discussions with Romanian MEPs in Brussels on Tuesday, to whom the Prime Minister told them “not to be explicit against Holland”, they told G4Media. .ro sources participating in the meeting. “We don’t tell them anything, that’s fine. And only after 2023 should we have a different approach,” Prime Minister Ciucă told MEPs.
On September 20, the Dutch parliament adopted a resolution calling on the Hague government not to take “irreversible steps” regarding Romania and Bulgaria’s accession to the Schengen area until they carry out “further investigations in terms of border surveillance. “by the two countries.
Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu explained to MEPs that “the Hague resolution is an open door” for Romania. Aurescu allegedly told them that the resolution was requested by the Dutch Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, in order not to be requested by the extremists. “Let’s leave Rutte, let’s not turn the subject into one of internal politics in the Netherlands”, Aurescu would have said.
The two Romanian officials allegedly assured MEPs that the Czech Republic, which holds the EU presidency, will put Romania’s Schengen membership on the Council’s agenda if Romania requests it.
Officially, the Romanian government announced that Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă had “a very practical discussion with Romanian MEPs, reconfirming the fact that, regardless of the political option, we share Romania’s European priorities”.
“As we have invoked in all the official meetings held in Brussels these days, Romania is ready to enter the Schengen Area. The positive results of the evaluation mission in the first part of October provide a coherent basis for obtaining the necessary political guarantees for the swift adoption of the accession decision, and this is the message we asked Romanian deputies to support, “Ciucă also said, according to the government statement.
Context
In the Netherlands, after the parliamentary elections of 15-17 March 2021, a coalition agreement was signed for the period 2021-2025 between the Conservative Liberal Party (VVD, member of the Renew Europe group), the Democratic Party 66 (D66, member of the Renew Europe group), the Christian Democracy Appeal (CDA, member of the PPE group) and the Christian Union (member of the PPE group). The current coalition government led by Prime Minister Mark Rutte (VVD) took office on 10 January this year.
The European Parliament adopted on Tuesday, by a large majority, a non-legislative resolution calling on the Council of the European Union to adopt, by the end of 2022, all the necessary measures to adopt the decision on the admission of Romania and Bulgaria to the Schengen area of free movement. The expansion of the Schengen area requires a unanimous decision by the EU Council.
Currently, among the EU member countries, only Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Ireland and Romania are not part of the Schengen area, which also includes non-member states of the EU bloc (Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein).
