The Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev blamed Romania for the failure to join Schengen Area, quoting a forthcoming report of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) and the Minister for Internal Affairs on "domestic political debate" in some EU Member States
The EU Council for Justice and Home Affairs met Tuesday and postponed, as expected, a decision on the accession of the two countries in the area of free movement within the European Union (EU). A decision to this effect has not been adopted until now because it lacked a unanimous support, Novinite.com writes
"I can stated that the problem is not Bulgaria’s " Plevneliev affirmed, quoted by the local media. "The phased approach is acceptable both to us and to Romania, but it seems we have to wait until Romania has done its job," the head of the Bulgarian state added.
According to the Bulgarian President," the big difference "was made by the European Commission (EC) by scheduling a CVM report on the situation in Romania in late 2012 and one for the situation in Bulgaria in late 2013.
On the other hand, the Bulgarian Minister of Interior Tsvetan Tsvetanov stated that Bulgaria "has unfortunately become a victim of domestic political debate in some European countries." He blamed the postponement of the Schengen Area accession on "populism". He added that his country supported the granting of a visa free travel regime for the Western Balkans countries.
In September, when the Interior Ministers of the EU member states were to discuss the enlargement of the Schengen area, the meeting was postponed because there were too few items on the agenda that had progressed enough to allow decision taking . Also in recent months, Germany and Belgium intensified their skepticism towards the accession of the two countries.
The current proposal for the two newest EU members suggests a two-step approach, namely the annulment of the internal border controls for sea and air transports with full accession to the Schengen Information System (SIS) in a first step, so that in the second step land borders be cancelled as well.