Romania "could join Schengen in September"

Romania's Schengen accession could be decided in September, by the Justice and Home Affairs Council.

The estimation was made Thursday by presidential adviser Leonard Orban, former European Commissioner, broadcasted by Radio Romania.

He talked about the accession process and the present state of the talks.

"The Cooperation and Verification Mechanism was used by certain member states to slow down Romania and Bulgaria's Schengen accession", presidential adviser Leonard Orban stated.

He said that at the moment, close and extremely harsh talks are held on solutions that could be passed to allow Romania to join Schengen.

"Right now, things are not clear. Otherwise, there are many options, the one most likely is a gradual accession, but we don't know because things could evolve in an unpredictable manner", Leonard Orban explained.

In his opinion, in any case of EU, Schengen or Eurozone accession, there is a technical political process involved, based also on community acquis conditions.

"These are mainly political processes and especially because of this, certain member states have said they do not trust enough Romania and Bulgaria, and it would be better to delay the Schengen accession of these states", the former European commissioner said.

Translated by: Ciocănel Tudor
MA Student, MTTLC, Bucharest University