Croatia, which joined the EU in 2013, may enter the Schengen area faster than Bulgaria and Romania. After joining the EU in 2007, the two countries have been waiting at least 8 years to enter the free movement area. On Tuesday 22 October, the European Commissioner for Migration, Dimitris Avramopoulos, recommended to the Council of the EU that Croatia also be included in the club of 26 members, which includes 22 Member States and 4 non-Member States.
Through “monitoring that has been going on for 4 years", Croatia has made “constant efforts to meet the Schengen area criteria”, said the Commissioner, who believes that the country is now perfectly managing the EU's external border, in particular with Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The European Commission has already assessed and confirmed the full implementation of Schengen rules in the fields of data protection, police cooperation, common visa policy, returns, the Schengen Information System (SIS), firearms and judicial cooperation in criminal matters, it said in a statement.
In a new communication, it states that Croatia has also taken all necessary measures in order that Schengen rules can be applied at external borders. For a candidate country for the free movement area, this means demonstrating that it can cooperate effectively with the law enforcement authorities of other Schengen States so that border controls can be abolished, and it can apply all the rules regarding the control of external land, sea and air borders (airports), the issue of Schengen visas, return procedures, police cooperation and the protection of personal data.
Finally, the candidate country must have proven it is fully capable of connecting to, and making use of, the Schengen Information System, which allows it to inform other Member States about the nature of the risks and threats it detects.
Since these criteria are all met (they are also met by Bulgaria and Romania, in the Commission's view), it is now up to the EU Council to act unanimously by the Schengen Member States, while the European Parliament is consulted.
In any case, this announcement is being made within a difficult context, since the Schengen area has not yet returned to normal since the migration crisis and the 2015 attacks; Member States such as Germany, Austria and France are continuing to apply temporary internal controls, with no plan as of yet to put an end to them. For more than 3 years now, the European Commission has been waiting for Member States to return to an area that is strictly without internal controls, but, as Dimitris Avramopoulos said, coercive action against these Member States would be pointless. Rather, it is necessary to "convince" them that this situation cannot continue. Link to the communication: https://bit.ly/2pFEk2I (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)