Central European Free Trade Agreement

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CEFTA flag

CEFTA member states

EU member states in 1992, 2002 and 2007 with dates of accession

The Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) is a trade agreement between countries in Central and South-Eastern Europe.

1 Members
2 Membership criteria
3 History
- 3.1 Original agreement
- 3.2 CEFTA 2006 agreement
4 Relations with the EU
5 See also
6 External link

[edit] Members

Current parties of the CEFTA agreement are Croatia and the Republic of Macedonia. Starting from the 1 May 2007 the parties will be also Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia and UNMIK on behalf of Kosovo. Former parties are Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.

Parties of agreement		joined	left
Poland		1992	2004
Hungary		1992	2004
Czechoslovakia	Czech Republic	1992	2004
Czechoslovakia	Slovakia	1992	2004
Slovenia		1996	2004
Romania		1997	2007
Bulgaria		1999	2007
Croatia		2003	—
Republic of Macedonia		2006	—
Bosnia and Herzegovina		2007	—
Moldova		2007	—
Serbia		2007	—
Montenegro		2007	—
Albania		2007	—
Kosovo		2007	—

[edit] Membership criteria

Former Poznań Declaration criteria:

World Trade Organisation membership
European Union Association Agreement with provisions for future full membership
Free Trade Agreements with the current CEFTA member states

Current criteria since Zagreb meeting in 2005:

WTO membership or commitment to respect all WTO regulations
any European Union Association Agreement
Free Trade Agreements with the current CEFTA member states

[edit] History

[edit] Original agreement

Original CEFTA agreement was signed by Visegrád Group countries, that is by Poland, Hungary and Czech and Slovak republics (this time parts of the Czech and Slovak Federative Republic) on 21 December 1992 in Kraków, Poland. It entered into force since July 1994. Through CEFTA, participating countries hoped to mobilize efforts to integrate Western European institutions and through this, to join European political, economic, security and legal systems, thereby consolidating democracy and free-market economics.

The agreement was amended by the agreements signed on 11 September 1995 in Brno and on 4 July 2003 in Bled.

Slovenia joined CEFTA in 1996, Romania in 1997, Bulgaria in 1998, Croatia in 2002 and Republic of Macedonia in 2006.

[edit] CEFTA 2006 agreement

Most of the parties of original agreement (the exceptions are Croatia and Macedonia) have joined the EU and thus left CEFTA. Therefore was decided to extend CEFTA to cover the rest of the Balkans states, which already had completed a matrix of bilateral free trade agreements in the framework of the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe. On 6 April 2006, at the South East Europe Prime Ministers Summit in Bucharest, a joint declaration on expansion of CEFTA to Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, UNMIK on behalf of Kosovo, Moldova, Serbia and Montenegro was adopted. ^[1] Accession of Ukraine has also been discussed.^[2] The new enlarged agreement was initialled on 9 November 2006 in Brussels and has been signed on 19 December 2006 at the South East European Prime Ministers Summit in Bucharest.^[3] Ratification is to take place before 31 March 2007, and the new CEFTA treaty will come into force on 1 May 2007.^[4]

[edit] Relations with the EU

All former participating countries had previously signed association agreements with the EU, so in fact CEFTA has served as a preparation for full European Union membership. Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia joined the EU on 1 May 2004, and Bulgaria and Romania did so on 1 January 2007. Croatia does not yet have a date specified, but is in the process of accession negotiations. Macedonia is official candidate country of the EU.

At the EU's recommendation, the future members prepared for membership by establishing free trade areas. A large proportion of CEFTA foreign trade is with EU countries.