"Today, we mainly talked about the
enlargement of the Union. We are already drafting rules and
taking action to launch a European debate on achieving these
accessions," Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi reported at the end of
the informal meeting of European affairs ministers in Murcia.
"We confirmed that it is a merit-based process - he explained
- and the candidate countries must accept some already
established criteria necessary to give credibility to the Union.
We talked about how to accelerate this process. A new
enlargement package of ten candidate countries with the prospect
of accession is imminent. We want to create new opportunities to
integrate these countries into the single market before
accession."
The commissioner said, "It's up to the countries to take
advantage of these opportunities. A treaty change is not
necessary to accept these countries."
"When the Council is ready - he added - so will the
Commission; the question, if anything, is whether the
enlargement countries will be ready by 2030."
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