Talk:Enlargement of the European Union/Archive 1

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Contents

Israel

http://www.euobserver.com/?sid=9&aid=17914

Maybe this opinion should be included in the section about Israel in some form?

Nightstallion 21:47, 3 Dec 2004 (CET)

The article states that Israel's law of reutrn would be in conflict with European freedom of movement - yet Germany has exactly the same law of return for Germans, and it is an EU member.
I also protest grouping Israel with the north african countries - Israel has much more commong with Europe than either Morocco or Tunisia, which are basically Arab countries that have nothing to do with Europe other than being occupied by European countries for some time. The case of Israel joining should be equated with Cyrpus or Malta rather than with 3rd world non-democratic countries. The only subject in which Cyprus is more European than Israel is that it has a majority of Christians in it while Israel has a Jewish majority - yet historically Judaism was a European religion centuries before Christianity even existed and the EU shows no problem with accepting other non-Christian majority countries (such as Turkey).
Most international criticism of the occupation of the Palestinian territories comes from European capitals

I'd say that most international criticism (as in broken relationships) comes from Islamic countries. You should rephrase it.

An argument for the inclusion of Israel into the EU as a full member is that it has a mostly European (or better: Europeanised) culture and thus forms an exclave in a huge Arabian area.

Why "Europeanised? Many Jews came to Israel from Europe, and so they brought their European culture into Israel. Also, many of the so called non-European Jews (from North Africa) came to these non-European middle-eastern countries from Europe some 500 years ago and retained their European culture (Spanish culture) rather than adopting the local Arab culture. Hence, Israeli culture can be equated to that of Italy - half the population brought with it north and central european culture (see Ashkenazim), while the other half brought south european culture (Spanish\Latin culture... see Sephardim). Although Israel also has a big Arab population (some 20% of Israelis are Arabs), it also has a significant non-Jewish European minority - some 7% of Israelis are non-Jewish Russians and Ukranians. Plus, after the enlargement of the EU into Eastern Europe, some 20% of Israelis can now get EU passports because of their direct European decsent. Should Ukraine be accpeted, as many as 60% of Israelis would be legible for EU passports, thus getting Israel into the EU through the back door (meaning the majority of Israelis will be able to influence EU politics while the EU will have no influence over inner Israeli politics because Israel is not a member).

Ratification progress

Has any W. European country ratified the treaty? David.Monniaux 16:59, 25 Sep 2003 (UTC)

the one for enlargement? I'm not sure but I think it is all done and dusted. -- Cabalamat 02:38, 26 Sep 2003 (UTC)
According to [1], only Cyprus, Denmark, Malta and Poland have ratified the treaty. Interesting - I wonder whether some skeptics will try to derail enlargment by voting against it in the national parliaments.David.Monniaux 00:20, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Edit war over Czechia vs. Czech Republic

I've protected the page. Please could all those involved in this edit war come to some decision on the talk page rather than reverting incessantly. Thank you. Angela

Good grief, has this edit war just been over what to call the western bit of the former Czechoslovakia? I know that the government of "Ceska Republika" have been trying to get English speakers to use an analogue of "Cechy", but quite simply "Czechia" is a name which is never used by native English-speaking people. -- Arwel 19:14, 21 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Arwel, I am a native speaker of English, and I use "Czechia". Just thought you might want ot know that -- Cabalamat 06:58, 23 Nov 2003 (UTC)
How long have you been doing that? No-one I know (and this is a circle of people who go there quite often) does. Arwel 12:02, 23 Nov 2003 (UTC)
I may be flogging a dead horse, but why didn't anyone point out that the Czech government itself has been pushing the denomination "Czechia" since 1993?
Czechia is the official one-word name of the Czech Republic. In 1993 the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic in its memorandum to all Czech embassies and diplomatic missions recommended to use the full name "Czech Republic" only in official documents and titles of official institutions. In all other cases, the one-word name Czechia should be preferred. [2]
— Miguel 18:50, 2004 Nov 14 (UTC)

Look - I don't mind the edit war on Czechia and Czech Republic. As if there's a lot of difference. I personally prefer Czech Republic because it's common, but Czechia is probably more correct and a lot more convenient. Anyway, protecting the page is a bad idea I think. It doesn't let the people who want to edit other parts of the article do so. For example, the incorrect GDP stats. The UN stats are out of date - we should go for the CIA Factbook 2003 stats, they are public domain as well and they are what Wikipedia uses most of. I've seen in the last months a slight rejection of the CIA Factbook by Wikipedians, but it remains the most standardised and up-to-date source for facts. For example, Romania's GDP PPP is $7,400 not $5,830. Croatia's GDP is not as high as listed. Hungary's GDP is inaccurate. Let's make an effort to make Wikipedia accurate. And, protecting the page is not necessary for minor things such as the Czechia issue. If there was mass vandalism, or revertion of the entire article, I suppose it would be right. But does it hurt if people argue over Czechia or Czech Republic. I think Wikipedia is fast changing in the bad. It's changed from an open-content, collaborative encyclopedia, to one that is ruled over by sysops and administrators who protect pages, and other Wikipedians like Shallot who choose to use proprietary sources. -- Ronline.

There would be no point in you making those changes in the middle of an edit war - they would simply be reverted along with everything else. It wasn't the fact that someone was changing Czechia to Czech Republic, but the fact that an edit war was going on that led to the article being protected. Without this, the edit war simply continues, filling up recent changes and polluting the article history. As it's been three days, I've unprotected it for now. Hopefully people will attempt to come to some agreement here this time rather than editing in a way that will lead to further protection. Angela 00:51, 22 Nov 2003 (UTC)
First of all, I did not _add_ the GDP numbers from the UN source, I merely normalized them according to the source listed on the page when I saw it (and notice how I mentioned in the commit message that it looked fishy). The source simply needs to be consistent; if you want to replace them with CIA Factbook numbers, sure, but make sure you use a single edition (not all Economy of foo pages on Wikipedia are using the same edition so you have to look it up upstream). On that matter, I also don't see why the UN is any more or less proprietary a source than the CIA. They should both be getting fed data from the local statistics bodies anyhow. --Shallot 18:28, 22 Nov 2003 (UTC)

The term "enlargement"

Q: How long have been the word "enlargement" used to refer to "accession of some state(s) to the CEE/EU"? Just wondering. Thanks. --Ann O'nyme 13:11, 10 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I can find a Reuters release from 1995 using the term - see [3] - and that's without looking very hard. Morwen 13:18, Feb 10, 2004 (UTC)
And here's one from 1992 - [4]

More colours to distinguish new states

Would it be possible for the image for each enlargment to show the new states in a different colour? It's not that easy to tell when you have to scroll up and down. --Phil 15:39, Mar 10, 2004 (UTC)

Done. --Shallot 18:55, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Figures in euros

Wouldn't it make sense to give the GDPs and such figures in euros instead of US dollars? -- Kimiko 18:13, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Also, giving subtotals and a total for each enlargment without giving the corresponding figures for the old EU is not as useful as it could be.

And what about possible enlargement by other European countries like Norway, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Iceland? -- Kimiko 18:22, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Talking to myself here :o) Here are some numbers:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/eurostat/Public/datashop/print-product/EN?catalogue=Eurostat&product=1-11032004-EN-AP-EN&mode=download
Any objections to using these to replace the current ones? -- Kimiko 18:59, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Nah, forget it. That link only gives GDP, not GDP/capita. GDP/capita is available somewhere else on europa.eu, but only from 2001. And I really don't feel like digging trough 10 or more national statistics websites. -- Kimiko 14:39, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
If you're talking to yourself, does this mean that you're ordering yourself to forget what you suggested? ;-)
James F. (talk) 15:23, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I could, but that only makes it worse.. :o) -- Kimiko 00:35, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

after may 1st: Merge Tables and delete the 2004 expansion section

After 1st May, someone should merge the first table with EU-15 countries with the 10 candidate countries information. TheWikipedian 20:24 GMT+2

Narrowing of the EU

What about narrowing of the EU? Article on dependant states mentions that Greenland left the EU on February 1st 1985, after acquiring home rule from Denmark. --Romanm 14:47, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It is already covered in the Special member state territories and their relations with the EU wiki

user:theWikipedian

Missing Issues, language problem, transitional measures, and job shift to the east

Languages: multiplying interpreters' costs

  • Language problem, In the European parliament all languages have to be translated in all other languages. At least the facility must be there. The amount of interpreters and the cost of translation would rise sharply. E.g. Latvian into Dutch needs a special interpreter. -- Andries
Regarding languages and translation, I think that subject would be best covered in one or more separate articles, after all it is an aspect of operation of the EU and not enlargement. -- Cabalamat 13:25, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I think it is important enough to be included here because the number of interpreters is a square function of the number of languages. Before May 1st there are 11 languages which means that 0.5(11^2-11)=55 interpreters are needed . In the case of 8 more languages on May 1st (I didn't include the language spoken on Malta because I don't know whether this is a separate language), the quantity of interpreters is 0.5(19^2-19)=171 That is a big difference and a lot of money. I don't know enough about the subject to contribute myself. Andries 13:59, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Of course, you go back to linear costs if everything goes through a fixed number (1 to 3) "working languages": you have one translation between language A and a working language, then a second translation between the working language and language B. Not very good for quality and spontaneity, but... David.Monniaux 22:01, 1 May 2004 (UTC)
let me guess: French, German and English. That question was raised a few yrs ago. People in here (Portugal) feared that was the end of the language (which is seen as a very important part of the country's History, origin, identity and connection to other peoples in the world) what made many to say "lets leave it!". Portuguese government was obviously against it. And I believe that will continue to be. And probably many governments throw Europe will be against. The UE grown because it respected the various cultures of Europe. Changing it will increment oposition, that is the lowest ever in EU, and people will get even more distant from the EU government. I think that a language to be official in Europe must have 1,000,000 million speakers, but there are problems, because some countries dont have that population and others have speakers of other languages that number that -- so incrinsing even more. -Pedro 21:18, 18 May 2004 (UTC)
David, what I want to say is that some people here in the Netherlands complain about that. E.g. last Sunday on TV. A prominent opinion maker was complaining about the cost and the lack of sponateity and quality due to "relay translations". I think this should be mentioned in the article Andries 18:55, 5 May 2004 (UTC)

Transitional Measures

  • Transitional measures, Labor market protection and limited access of food processing companies to the EU market. Do farmers in the new EU states get money from the EU, just like the farmers in the old EU states? -- Andries
Farmers in new EU countries will get a lower rate of subsidy than fartmers in existing countries, as a transitional measure. I think (but am not sure) that transitional measures will last for up to 10 years. -- Cabalamat 13:25, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Andries 09:10, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Shift of jobs from old to new members statest

Today I read an article in the German magazine der Spiegel (nr. 18 26.04.04) that treated the shift of jobs from Germany to the new members states. This will be, I think, an important consequence of the enlargement. Andries 18:18, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Sealand

I don't see why including Sealing is making fun of the wikipedia. After all, it is not legally recognised as a state, but neither the UK nor the UN have done anything to stop Sealand acting a fiscal paradise. Theoretically, the Vatican City could also apply to join the EU. Is that funny too?

user:theWikipedian

  • But The Vatican is already associated with the EU. It even has its euro coins. I don't know if it can... Probabily not. Sealand doesn't exist! And I find a stupidity that it even got a page like if it were a country. It is only a curiosity, we also have got our fantasy kingdom: Kingdom of Berlengas Islands (Reino das Berlengas)... on real Islands! "Governed" today by an Old man and his grandchild. Sealand? be serious! Pedro 02:54, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Please note that the vatican has no asociation agreements with the eu. It is allowed to mint its own euro coins (in fact, minted by Italy) because of the existance of a previous agrement with the italian state.

Until the UN rules out the statehood of Sealand, no matter how silly or stupid a contry might be, it is still a legal uncertainty. If the Uk invades Sealand some day, this issue will be over.

Of course that in practice to consider sealand a state does not make sense. But it is a legal exception that should be considered, at least in the miscellanius subsection.

That why I support reintroducing Sealand in this wiki. case.It is unknown wether this "country" could join the union (in theory). In practice, the UK has never acknowledge Sealand's independece, so it is unlikely that a sea platform could be recognised a a state of the union.

user:theWikipedian

What's Italy? What's the EU? From the article:(...)Kingdom of Belgium, the Kingdom of Denmark, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Hellenic Republic, the Kingdom of Spain, the French Republic, Ireland, the Italian Republic, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Republic of Austria, the Portuguese Republic, the Republic of Finland, the Kingdom of Sweden, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (Member States of the European Union) They are the European Union. Think a little about you've written: Until the UN rules out the statehood of Sealand, no matter how silly or stupid a contry might be, it is still a legal uncertainty. If the Uk invades Sealand some day, this issue will be over. That's not stupid, that's a lunatic POV. Sorry for that. It even unlikely that they'll think about that, and it is a lost of time debating such a thing. In Northern Italy, there's a more serious fantasy country that even has border control. And the numorous european nations under the rule of european states, what about them? Excepting for Portugal and Ireland, every country of the EU has other nations under control, how many declared independence? In Spain, almost every autonomony is a fantasy country (Catalonia, Galicia, etc...) and they believe that they are countries, what about that? --Pedro 16:06, 30 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Sealand should not be included. It is not an officially recognised country, in fact it is little more than a helicopter platfrom in the sea. Your comment as to whether the Vatican joining is funny too makes no sense. The Vatican is a recognised country, and so could join, though this is highly unlikely. Grunners
About the comment that the Vatican only has its own coins by agreement with Italy: WRONG. If they didn't have permission from the EU, that would mean they'd count as Italian coins. AND, if they counted as Italian coins, that would mean Italy would have two sets (I'm just including the Vatican for this theoretical) of coins, which it can't. - RedHot 18:11, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Cyprus

The Cyprus article states that: EU Enlargement Commissioner Günter Verheugen declared that Green Line, dividing Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and Greek Authority of Southern Cyprus, will be the border of union beginning from 1 May 2004.

I think this article should reflect that too. The total area of the island is 9,250 sq. km and the population a little over 770,000. So the numbers in the box should also be changed to include the Greek part only. But I have no idea what the figures are for the 2 parts.

Do the 2 UK sovereign bases of Dhekalia and Akrotiri form part of the Union or not? D.D. 09:25, 1 May 2004 (UTC)

I want to see a cite for that quote before we run with it. It seems unlikely, especially considering the use of the term 'Greek Authority of Southern Cyprus'. Morwen 09:36, May 1, 2004 (UTC)

Have a look at [5], [6] and [7]. D.D. 10:00, 1 May 2004 (UTC)

Out of the perspective of daily practice Mr. Verheugen's statement is of course right, but still, according to international law (and according to the EU, since they have no intention (yet?) to recognize the Turkish republic of Cyprus as an independant state) the whole island joined the EU, not just the southern part. Gugganij 13:06, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

I changed the data for Cyprus since only the southern (Greek) part of Cyprus acceded to the European Union. See Cyprus and Cyprus reunification referendum, 2004. Either this article should remain like this or this and all other articles should be changed to reflect that the whole island is (officially - not de facto) part of the EU. D.D. 13:17, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

Since in my point of view, the article should reflect in first place the legal status according to international law, the opinion of the Union and virtually the opinion of all countries in the world, which regard the Government of the Greek part as the legitimate government of all Cyprus, the article should be changed (with a footnote added that EU law is currently not applied in the northern part). Likewise, all the articles you mentioned should be changed accordingly as well. Gugganij 14:07, 2 May 2004 (UTC)
... and, indeed, seemingly from the (desired, at least) point of view of the Turkish Cypriots themselves, given the referendum result.
As far as I think Wikipedia should state, Cyprus is a single country with a good third of it occupied by a generally-unrecognised militia (but that significant steps have been taken in the direction of reuniting the island). We don't claim that FARC-held land is another country, for example.
James F. (talk) 17:30, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

That is probably the best way to go. I have adapted the article accordingly, and will adapt the others too. D.D. 18:54, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

Latin America

Isn't this part really going overboard!? Is there anything to corroborate thing "de facto members" theory? David.Monniaux 21:56, 1 May 2004 (UTC)

I wonder where is the supporting document? I have never seen one, even being somewhat of a europhile. Though myth may say otherwise, most of what the EU does is well-documented. -- Kaihsu 21:58, 2004 May 1 (UTC)
Even too wel documented, it's impossible for a mere mortal to grok all the relevent documents, and even if theyt usually don't mean anything
http://ec.europa.eu/comm/external_relations/la/
In any case, which bit in that site supports the statements (verbatim from what I deleted)?: The European Union seeks close relations with the states of Latin America (mainly Chile and Mexico which are near the European level) and to a lesser extent Brazil and might in the future accept them as de facto members although formal membership is of course out of the question. -- Kaihsu
This is a late reply, but I just wonder what on earth a "De facto EU member" is. 惑乱 分からん 18:23, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Norway

Norway, like most other Scandinavian states, is reluctant to surrender sovereignty to a central European government. The Norwegian government also wishes to keep control of fishery resources in their territorial waters. Norway has applied twice for EEC and EU membership, but the two referenda on the issue have been lost by the government.

I found this confusing. Does it mean to say that the people don't want to join but their government does? If so, can someone clarify the paragraph for easier reading, and it would be very interesting to hear about this discrepancy; as an outsider, I would think the government would drop it, if the people are as reluctant as the article seems to claim. Tempshill 23:53, 1 May 2004 (UTC)

Yes, twice now Norwegian governments have negotiated entry terms to the EEC/EU, and had the plan rejected in subsequent referendums. Norwegian public opinion seems quite variable, and I believe is currently more favourable to to membership. Arwel 11:48, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

Former Yugoslavia

re: Koraths Revision as of 06:07, 2 May 2004 [8]]

I think most readers aren't aware of the diffrence between the communist regime in the Former Yugoslavia and the Soviet Bloc so this should be mentioned in the text as it's relevent when considering Yugoslavias chance in the 1980s.

Also, can we make it clear Albania isn't part of former Yugoslavia? Grunners

Missing Malta

Malta is missing from 2 of the small maps Image:Crude-EU27.png and Image:Crude-EUXX.jpg. I put Malta in the first map Image:Test Crude-EU25-colored stretched greens.png but didn't get around to fixing the others and am too busy to do that for the next 3 weeks. The previous Malta-less map has some some discussion on shadings.

Also I have what seems to be a cache problem on the actual thumb image [9] that I cannpt clear by the usual shift-contol-R to force a reload.

The problem only affects my Opera and Firebird, but is Ok in IE.

The problem is Malta appears dark green but when I examine the actual image it's the correct pale green, and conversely when I download the actual thumb image it's dark green! I'm hoping this is a weird caching problem on my side and not some browswer dependency server side. -Wikibob | Talk 22:20, 2004 May 5 (UTC)

Why do countries (usually) want to join?

I've wondered about this for some time. Many countries (especially Turkey) are making huge changes to their policies and governmental structures in order to join the EU. This article never explains why countries are willing to do so much to join -- or why some countries don't want to join. Quadell 16:27, May 6, 2004 (UTC)

every country in Europe wants to join, even Russia. Some people that live very well (richest in the world that doesnt interest them, like Norway's population - the country wanted to join, didn't because of a referendum) Iceland is in talks to join.

Why?

  1. The sudden richeness of Ireland, Spain, Portugal and Greece (former poor countries) -- this is, by large, the toppest motivation.
  2. belonging to a club of top economies.
  3. Together countries get richer, and economy grows because there is more population, more room, more economy.
  4. To be a super-power, Europeans dislike the American rule, so they want to become a super-power, alone they can't. They already are the world toppest economy. The market is unified since 1992. There is no such thing as German market, French market... There is a single market.
  5. The richest countries of Europe/world are part of It. Germany is the 3rd, France now the 4th, UK the 5th.
  6. Everyone has power in the EU. Even if it's small.
  7. Bolonging to the EU is a goal to every European government, every single one.
  8. it has allways been a dream since the fall of the Roman Empire, many tried by force, the EU is winning it by agreement.
  9. The most historical countries of Europe are part of it. All of them, some very old countries that didnt want to loose independence throw out History, like France, Denmark, UK or Portugal.
  10. etc.

--User:PedroPVZ

The list above is a bit repetitive and self-referential, but it's mostly correct. The aspiring members are generally attracted first and foremost by the economic benefits of the single market -- the removal of taxes for their exports into other EU countries means the world to most European countries because most of their import/export is done with the rest of the continent.
(This also happens to be one of the principal reasons why the US has only had limited success in luring/strongarming/whatever European countries into cooperation with it WRT the Iraq war. Promises from and friendship with a superpower is all cool and great, but when two thirds of your exports are directly subject to EU trade tariffs, you're much more inclined to listen to them instead.)
The money that the rest of EU invested into the "old new" members also looked attractive, but it's pretty clear to everyone that the EU won't be so generously subsidizing all new members like that in the future. Nevertheless, this doesn't really pose a problem, most applicant countries would/will still improve greatly with much less.
The political angle is also reasonably important to most countries as there are many indirect benefits to having stronger ties with the neighbours on the continent, but I believe that it's generally the economics that drive the accession process forward, both in the opinion of the public and the political elites in prospective member countries.
--Shallot 20:53, 6 May 2004 (UTC)
it's all about money, that's why it's repetitive. Pedro 23:06, 6 May 2004 (UTC)
Its not all about money. Many countries and/or citizens want to join the EC/establish closer ties for reasons of security and democracy. Warfare between European countries used to be endemnic, but is now over within the the EC. And by joining the EC you ensure the survival of democracratic institutions, which is obviously a concern of the new democracies in Eastern Europe. :ChrisG 17:01, 7 May 2004 (UTC)
Security maybe, not sure. Democracy I don’t believe in it. I believe the younger generation already feels as Europeans. A European nationalist sentiment is growing, but it depends how the EU sees its youngsters. Erasmus exists for something; it’s to build to facilitate the sentiment of union.Pedro 20:25, 7 May 2004 (UTC)


Turkey is a very complex case, with competing agendas.

a) Secularists/Kemalist – Want to anchor Turkey to western values of human rights/democracy/ free market/etc. It was Ataturk’s ambition for Turkey to be a modern European country.

b) Business – The people you would think would be most in favour of EU accession, but are at best indifferent. The largest Turkish companies are all family own conglomerates, and wield enormous power; they fear that opening Turkey up to increasing competition will result in a decrease in their power. SMEs are in the whole very pro EU, as they want the faster economic growth and stability.

c) Nationalist – Very suspect of the EU, and do not want EU laws on minority rights. They do want though to get more international influence.

d) Religious conservative – Expects that the EU rules will remove many of the strict secular laws, on such things a ban on headscarves in public buildings, or religious teaching in schools.


On the whole though, "poor" EU countries can access vast funding for infrastructure projects and regeneration. These promote rapid economic development resulting in a rich market for the EU member nations who donated the money in the first place.

It is worth also noting that the EU was envisioned to bring together warring European powers (i.e. France and Germany), tying them together politically socially and economically so make war less likely. That having been achieved it could be argued that the logical next step it to expand that sphere of stability to places like Turkey and Greece.

Turkey has already a customs union with the EU (since 1987 I think) and has recently been called "competitive enough to face European competition" by the European Commission I think. Membership could provide more financial aid however (structural funds). Mjolnir1984 23:14, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Caucacus states

I edited the recent addition on Caucusus. A few things that I changed:

  • I removed the claim that Caucusus invented wine. Other countries claim that as well.
  • I toned down the very upbeat style in which the text about Georgia was written.
  • I removed the sentence that Mikhail Saakashvili's government in Georgia has almost eradicated corruption. I believe they have made a tremendous progress but it's a bit too early to claim that, as they have only been in power for less than a year.

Let me know if I have made any mistakes. A few questions that I have:

  • Can Georgia really join by 2010? It's 2004 now and, for almost all previous EU expansion countries, it has taken more than 6 years from the time when they applied to when they joined.
  • Is Armenia so far behind the other two countries as it sounds from the text? "Economy of Armenia is recovering but very slowly...", etc. Are those claims accurate? Any sources confirming that?

I didn't feel sufficiently knowledgable to change these things but they should certainly be cross-checked. 18:39, May 16, 2004 (UTC)

-I would have to say that I don't know much about the Caucacus states but looking at country profiles and statistics from the region I think the addition seems appropriate. Georgia seems to be a likely EU candidate although entry as early as 2010 i think is optimistic (yet possable). I think reading the news over the past few days that the dismissal of a European representative in the country could damage this relationship but the EU, at least that I know of, seems keen on Georgia's currrent pro-western approach. But I think it will not be able to enter untill disputes are resolved which is disapointing as it still has two regions under conflict which are not expected to be settled as easily as Ajaria. May 17 2004

Contrary to what seems to be an amusing trend of wishful thinking among the various (semi-)anonymous editors, it's entirely surreal that a country with 3200 USD GDP per capita, at least a couple of fairly rebellious provinces, that has just barely deposed an authoritarian ruler, that is in the vicinity of several rather problematic places and no other EU countries, and that hasn't even applied for candidate status, could become part of the EU within the decade. Heck, three years from now is considered a wee bit optimistic in the case of Bulgaria which has been working on accession treaties for years now and that has much better stats than Georgia... And don't get me wrong, .ge is just an example, others are similar or worse. --Shallot 18:42, 17 May 2004 (UTC)

-As an after thought to what I wrote earlier I would like to add that I have not in any way added to this page (as seems to be the accustation when reffering to "(semi-)anonymous editors") . Just studying for Modern History this Friday and so decided to comment. I would like to know when the Caucacus states (specially your contested Georgia) might enter though I have to say after inquiring with my proffessors I feel that they seem optimistic in that they think an early entry date is possable in the case of Georgia. 18 May 2004

  • Please, provide evidence (for example, links to articles saying that). 17:23, May 18, 2004 (UTC)

Projections when countries will join

Our article has projections when a particular country could join EU (like "around 2020" for Ukraine). Where do they come from and how accurate they are? Particularly, for countries like Georgia or Ukraine which have not even started negotiating. Could people document the sources of these estimates on the talk page? Andris 18:22, May 18, 2004 (UTC)

I quite agree - i was pondering stripping out all that speculation, but its quite a major change. Wikipedia is not futurology. Morwen 19:06, May 18, 2004 (UTC)
I strongly agree. This article is full of POV. In the past it even had info about an oil platform joining! My projection is that it will join by 2025 when an asteroid will crash against earth. Now seriously, A single topic about future joins (credible) is enough. --Pedro 19:54, 18 May 2004 (UTC)

I propose the following plan. I will search on google for information and leave the years that are confirmed by reliable sources. Ones for which we do not find confirmations will be removed. Everyone is welcome to contribute their sources as well.

As a first step, I searched for Croatia and rewrote the section according to what I found. Here are my sources [10], [11]. If any Croatians have different information, feel free to contribute. Andris 04:21, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

It's a good plan. I did a cursory google search for "Croatia EU date" and quickly came up with this reasonably in-depth assessment from The Economist Intelligence Unit, and a similar analysis from the International Center for Economic which corroborate "possibly 2007, likely by 2010" that we had in the article for Croatia. I don't recall seeing any analysts that would provide opinions/data directly contradicting this sentiment, so I think it would be fair to restore it. Chancellor Schroeder's opinion is relevant, but he seems to be merely voicing a consensus (with an optimistic rather than a pessimistic overtone, obviously for political reasons). --Shallot 09:36, 19 May 2004 (UTC)
Great! That looks like a good source. Feel free to restore the previous version on Croatia. Andris 14:38, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

Second step: Macedonia [12]. Andris 04:26, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

One more source: Ukraine [13]. Andris 04:39, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

[14] about Moldovia User:80.1.242.163

[15] about Serbia & Montenegro (2012) and Turkey (2015). Andris 22:58, May 22, 2004 (UTC)

[16] about Caucacus[17]and other european countries becoming part of EU-neighbours policy

[18]about Macedonia for 2010

[19] a good site about the eu and enlrgement

"Indeed, the European Union—oddly, given its name—has never defined its membership limits in geographical terms. That's fortunate for Georgia, where the government recently created a minister of integration in Europe. According to the Georgian Messenger[20] , President Mikhail Saakashvili recently—very optimistically—projected that Georgia would need a maximum of three years before it could realistically consider joining the union, but it's clearly in his sights." This was from a website I found. You wanted to know when Georgia hopes to join and here it is but the Georgian Messenger will take a while to navigate so if you want to verify this quote for sure then I will leave that hassel to you! Good luck!

[21] "The four Western Balkan countries (Serbia-Montenegro, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia, Albania) are hoping to join the EU between 2010 and 2015."

[22] "Moldova and Ukraine have expressed a desire to join the union but enlargement commissioner Günter Verheugen has said that their accession is 'not on the Commission's agenda'."

[23] "The main positive feature for the EU and its cooperation with these three countries is the fact that all these three countries voluntarily want to become members of the European family -- and I do not mean [a] member of the European Union. It means that they value European standards and are voluntarily ready to change their legislation to correspond to European standards as concerns their societies and democratic developments within the society,"

..."Another EU official, who asked not to be named, said it could take five years before the EU is prepared to look at incorporating Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia into the program"

BBC News article on Croatia becoming a candidate Irish Times Online article about the same but with some sort of subscription

This article should be called "futurology"

This article should be called "futurology". I think It shoulb be placed under Futurology in Europe (as a case of it). Why doesnt it comment on past enlargment and why it centers on teorical and unrealistic joins. Georgia in 3 yrs?.... --Pedro 22:26, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

  • I think there should be predictions, since our readers might want to know that. But only reasonably reliable ones. EU official ones (Bulgaria/Romania in 2007) or recognized independent sources like Reuters poll of economists from leading European banks. I am quite skeptical about giving years for Armenia, since I can't find any good sources. Or Georgia, since we only have the prediction by their own government. Andris 05:43, 30 May 2004 (UTC)
    • most of them would only need a small quote, except the most credible ones, that is Croacia, Romenia, Bulgaria and Turkey. Other somewhat credible, can be commented in pairs, like the countries from the ex-yuguslavia or the countries in the orbit of Russia. The rest are almost pure fantasies. And Sealand is again in the article, oh my god! People will read this and laugh. -Pedro 08:56, 30 May 2004 (UTC)

Geography as a reason against accession

Why is geography mentioned so much in this article? Distance might be an issue but Turkey isn't much further from Europe then Greece. And its closer then the Maghreb or Israel. Geography is irrelevant except for xenophobes who have no better excuse to not let a country in except technical arbitrary geographical definitions (now you might argue that Europe is culturally defined and therefore Israel and Turkey can't join.. but that's something else). - CJWilly

Geography is important because the EU has *in principle* accepted that all European nations have a right to join as long as they fulfill the Copenhagen criteria. Now the EU hasn't altogether *rejected* the idea of non-European nations ever joining the EU, but neither is it required to accept such membership.
Now is this just a legalistic excuse to explain away the fear of cultural and political differences? Ofcourse! But nonetheless it's an excuse that's convenient. However certain sections of the article should indeed be reworded to indicate this -- the non-inclusion of Israel will probably because of fear of the Palestinian conflict than its existence in Europe or not -- likewise with the Caucasus region. Aris Katsaris 19:16, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Hmmmm, Greece is in Europe (so is a small part of Turkey as a matter of fact). And accession of the Maghreb countries or Israel isn't on the cards, certainly not anytime soon. Morocco has applied before and been turned down, and none of the others ever have, even if some in those countries would like to see a bid. Turkey is an entirely different matter. Negotiations on their entry have been going on for years. There is constant talk of how Turkey's application is going — just a few minutes ago I was reading an article about how there are moves there to outlaw adultery which the EU is not happy about. Most commentators expect Turkey to be in sooner or later, they have had their entry delayed somewhat but it's very likely to happen. I don't think geography is irrelevant at all. Think of how the EU came about in the first place. There were two political imperatives: first the need to bind together industries in different countries that might be useful for war production, as a way of making continuing war in Europe impossible; and second to open up borders and allow freer trade and greater wealth generation. The first one does hint at a culturally defined Europe — one that has spent hundreds of years alternating between uneasy peace with shifting alliances, and outright conflict or the tyranny of one nation over another's people. The second also relates to geography, in that it's very useful for, say, the Germans to trade with the French without tariffs and bureaucracy, or for workers to move across the border freely. Admitting Tanzania or Paraguay to the EU wouldn't really fit with either of these goals — it surely has to count against a country if they aren't even in Europe — that's not xenophobia. As for the idea the Turkey can't join if Europe is culturally defined, this idea is something used by both advocates and opponents of Turkish entry. Opponents, often conservative ones, point to Islam as being incompatible with the Christian and secular traditions of the West (even though Turkey is a secular Muslim nation and not a theocracy by any means). Advocates point to Turkish history — historically the country has been closely involved in European affairs, and its focus has been very European, you only have to look at the Ottoman Empire. Geography then isn't an arbitrary way of deciding whether a country belongs in or out, it's important but often in ways far from straightforward. I hope this provides some insight. — Trilobite (Talk) 19:42, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC)
The article gave me the impression that geography was part of the Copenhagen Criteria, which later research seems to suggest it was not. Could someone confirm or deny this for me? - Marc

What the...is this page in some way linked with wiki

http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Enlargement_of_the_European_Union

See Wikipedia:Copies_of_Wikipedia_content_(low_degree_of_compliance)#WordIQ. -- Arwel 19:30, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC)

distance to the Caucasus and the roadblocks inbetween

Trilobite, consider that Greece has just a few hundred kilometers of international waters of Ionian sea between Crete and southeastern Italy (around Otranto), and the nearby countries are Albania and Tunisia, none of which could really pose a threat for Greece or Italy. Then consider that Georgia has three or four times the distance of international waters of the Black sea only to get to the newest arrivals (Romania and Bulgaria), let alone the western countries, and then there's Russia and Ukraine (and their interests and their navy) very nearby, as well as Turkey which also isn't a member yet. In the context of the Caucasus states overall, Armenia likely also has a huge grudge against Turkey because of the 1920s genocide so that won't quite help them either, at least not in the short term... so basically they have various geopolitical obstacles on their route to EU that we need to explicate and can't set aside just because of a reasonably benevolent policy of the EC. --Joy [shallot] 10:40, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Macedonian entry

intresting article [[24]]

Enlargement_Of_The_European_Union.gif needs to be amended to include Macedonia as a candidate. Robertbrockway 14:11, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Picture

There is a nice picture of anti-EU protesters in Warsaw by User:Space Cadet. I have no idea where to place it though. Any ideas?

Image:UE Nie.JPG
Protesters in Warsaw


Euroskepticism, perhaps? They aren't pertinent to the enlargement itself, which is already done in .pl. --Joy [shallot] 12:49, 13 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Turkey - Armenia issue real

Well, finally, it seems that the addition of the Armenia dispute itself is to some degree valid. A news story this morning in the Irish Times, makes mention of France wanting to see Turkey apologise for the massacre as part of entry conditions. Free online version of story

I still say though that the Turkey issue be summarised in a neutral fashion and the full long piece moved to its own article.

zoney ♣ talk 11:43, 14 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Aha! I just came onto this talk page to suggest that very thing. Moving the whole Turkey section to Accession of Turkey to the European Union or something like that and coming up with a brief summary here would allow us to get the NPOV dispute notice off what is otherwise a mostly undisputed page, and to slim this article down. It is currently a weighty 40KB, and policy says articles should be chopped up before they get that big. Does anyone object? — Trilobite (Talk) 16:16, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Good idea. Go ahead. --Rudi Dierick 21:03, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Done. The new article needs work. Some of it is really poorly written. I have left only the briefest of summaries in the main article so someone might want to at least add the main arguments for and against entry. I've moved the Turkey arguments from this talk page to Talk:Accession of Turkey to the European Union. I have also got rid of the NPOV notice, as the problematic passages have departed. — Trilobite (Talk) 23:57, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)

futurology, again

Wishful thinking seems to have escalated, again :) While mildly amusing, the maps that include up to 46 members are really not particularly encyclopedic. --Joy [shallot] 00:00, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

The maps show only the possibilities and the statistics show the numerical aspect of enlargements (GDP, population, etc.), everywhere in the text is written that "this is not likely to happen at all or at least not in the long term", etc. similar formulations. Anything after Croatia is vauge. The maps with 46 members are not much less encyclopedic than those with 32 or 33. No one knows for sure what will happen in the Balkans. At the same time Ukraine/Caucaus/etc. may jump ahead - again nothing is sure... My point is - the article covers good both possibilities - to join and to not join. Alinor 17:56, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Yes, I agree that it's just possibilities, but I'm saying that we don't really need all those possibilites depicted so graphically (sic) in this article, talking about everything at this length creates an impression of more than just probability. Until recently, we didn't have maps for anything other than the addition of .hr and .tr, and nobody complained about any missing maps... --Joy [shallot] 22:46, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Regardless of whether it is futurology or not, I'm not quite happy with the new maps before 1990 because they actually show territory of the EU which wasn't its territory back then - East Germany. Could someone correct that, please? Nightstallion 21:47, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Kazakhstan - small or big ...

The right place to argue about these things is not here, but anyway - what is the source for these '100000sq.km' - maybe its more, maybe its less... Also, if we start counting in % - what is the percentage for Turkey, Russia?

The part of Kazakhstan in Europe is pretty clearly defined by the geographical tradition to be the territory between its westernmost border and the Ural river. If I remember correctly, it's mostly composed of the alluvial lowland around the river, and some desert-like land to the west.
I included a percentage after the area was added by someone else, because without an emphasis of the relativity, the simple fact that this territory is peripheral both to Europe and to Kazakhstan could easier have been ignored.
On that matter, in this day and age, the geographical tradition doesn't necessarily have that much more relevance to the border between Europe and Asia than the political border between Russia and Kazakhstan does. So the inclusion of .kz into this page on the basis of it being a European country is based on a shaky premise.
--Joy [shallot] 22:40, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)
OK, I agree with all that. I am just wanting to know how much sq.km. are the european territories of these states... any proven data? I have made rough CONSERVATIVE measurements by partitioning the area into rectangles and using simple distance tool. I get over 140000 for .kz, so I assume its ~150000.
I added the text "roughly 100,000 sq.km." which I arrived at by quick application of the same method described above. I looked for a published source of data and could not find one. I added the number because I felt that the original text, "relatively small", was too subjective, and needed some quantification, even if only accurate to the nearest power of 10. I take no position on whether or not .kz should be considered for membership. --Key45 20:23, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)
On the Russia and Turkey pages there are links "Political divisions" and there is map showing the provinces. Then I can combine the areas (this works also for population) of the needed provinces (some error is added, becouse not every province border is exacltly following Europe borders, but anyway - this method is accurate enough, much more than rectangle partitioning). The problem is that Kazakhstan, Georgia does not have any maps showing the regions and Azerbaijan does have a map, but dosn't have data (area/population) for the regions...

---

  • The last time I saw this article it reached the causasus, now it is in Russia and Kazakistan. OMG, in a month I bet it will reach China :D --Pedro 18:51, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thats a great idea. I'll add it. Shall I add the other asian countries as well? what about the middle east. I think Israels a likely-hood so the rest will surely follow!