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European Union embarks on expansion

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LONDON, England (CNN) -- Europe is on the verge of a period of dramatic growth.

In May 2004, 10 new nations join the union, including eight former communist states. Two more are expected to join in 2007 and a review of Turkey's application will be made in December 2004. By the end of the decade the EU's land mass could have been stretched by a third and its population swelled by more than 100 million to almost half a billion.

The European community has expanded four times in the half century since six core nations -- Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands -- agreed to place their coal and steel production under a single, supranational authority in 1951.

Until now, however, expansion has been an incremental affair. In previous enlargements -- in 1973, 1981, 1986 and 1995 -- the union took on just three, one, two and three new members, respectively.

In May 2004 10 new members will join -- Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Malta and Cyprus. The EU's population will be swelled by 20 percent to 450 million.

 IN-DEPTH
EU Enlargement
  •  Embarking on expansion
  •  EU enlargement map
  •  History of EU growth
  •  Nice: Europe's next steps
  •  What kind of Europe?
  •  Key leaders' views
 

First wave

Negotiations with the leading wave of candidates mostly from the ex-communist eastern bloc -- the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Poland, Hungary, Slovenia and Estonia -- began in March 1998.

The six frontrunners targeted an entry date of January 2003 -- the time they say their institutions and markets would be ready for the rough-and-tumble of the EU's free market. But analysts say this timetable was overly optimistic.

To join would-be members have to bring their national laws into conformity with the union's strict criteria on everything from human rights to the environment and ensure that the political mood does not sour on accession.

Second wave

A second group of aspirants -- Romania, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Latvia, the Slovak Republic and Malta -- began negotiations in February 2000.

In October 2002 the European Commission gave its verdict.

In 2004 it would admit 10 of the 13 applicants -- not including Turkey. The European Commission report said Turkey, which has been an EU candidate since 1999, met political and economic membership criteria but needed to clean up its human rights record.

Romania and Bulgaria -- which faced greater difficulty than some of their eastern neighbours tackling economic, political and social issues after years under communist rule -- were given a date of 2007.

At the European summit in Copenhagen in December 2002 it was formally agreed to admit the 10 newcomers in May 2004. A much-disappointed Turkey -- now with a new government -- was told its case would be reviewed in December 2004 and entry talks could begin shortly afterwards if there had been significant improvements in the country's human rights record and treatment of its Kurdish minority.

Turkey, a NATO member and decades-long EU aspirant, had agreed in principle in December 2000 to the measures it had to take to join the EU but had seen its EU talks stall amid human rights concerns.

Turkey's decision to sentence Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan to death in June 1999 prompted a formal objection from European leaders. The sentence has yet to be carried out.

Still with only a distant hope of membership is Ukraine, a country with a population the size of France -- 50 million. After the accession of Poland, Ukraine will lie on the EU's eastern border.

Ukraine received $3.72 billion in financial assistance from the EU -- its largest overseas donor -- between 1991-99.

But the country is still coming to terms with its Soviet legacy -- including the nuclear accident at Chernobyl in 1986 -- and the EU has criticised government of President Leonid Kuchma for the lack of political freedoms.

Logistical hurdles

The road to accession is strewn with logistical hurdles as most EU institutions were designed for a smaller, cosier club.

Accommodating a dozen newcomers, observers say, means a wholesale rethinking of issues ranging from the size of the decision-making commission, to how to weigh and allocate votes and what procedure to follow when tallying those votes.

Othon Anastasakis, a researcher at the London School of Economics' European Institute, said: "Because there are major internal problems (within the EU infrastructure), sometimes the technical part of the negotiations and the technical part of bringing those countries closer to the EU has been delayed."

To rectify these problems, representatives from the 15 member governments met in a year-long inter-governmental conference, which started in February 2000 and established a blueprint for institutional reform which ended with the announcement of enlargement of the union from 15 to 25 members.

Another inter-governmental conference will be held in Germany in 2004 to discuss the next round of constitutional changes.

Fears over growth

Membership of the EU means instant access to one of the world's most competitive marketplaces -- 390 million consumers strong. And for some EU leaders, the benefits of taking on new members are not clear-cut.

"There is a problem with political will coming from the EU and that has always been a problem," said Anastasakis. "The most obvious excuse the EU gives is that there is a wide gap between the economic and political development of eastern and western countries."

Those who oppose enlargement cite a number of reasons: Worries about the impact of cheap labour and goods from new members' markets; a reluctance to shoulder the added budgetary burden of an expanded Europe; concerns, especially prevalent in France, that more members means a smaller portion of the subsidy pie for domestic farmers in existing EU states.

And French President Jacques Chirac's plea before the German parliament for a "pioneer group" of cutting-edge European countries able to forge ahead with their own agenda has heightened uncertainty.

"The EU wants to create a wider, homogeneous Europe," says Anastasakis. "But when you see voices from France and Germany calling for a Federal Europe, a multiple-speed Europe, that means there is less political will to accept those countries perceived as backwards."

The prospect of membership, however, carries enormous symbolic weight for many of the candidates.

Toomas Hendrik Ilves, Foreign Minister of Estonia -- a Baltic nation of 1.4 million people that will join in May 2004 said: "We were cut off from the union by being invaded by the Soviet Union in 1940 and we have followed the development of Europe since then without being a part of it."




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