Vladimir Mitev
The Bridge of Friendship spoke to Radu Dinescu, Secretary General of the National Union of Road Hauliers in Romania, about reports of a supposed agreement between Austria, Romania and Bulgaria for Romania and Bulgaria to join Schengen at the air and sea borders in March 2024. The Romanian Interior Ministry announced the existence of this agreement yesterday evening, on 27 December 2023. On the afternoon of 28 December 2023, Bulgarian Prime Minister Nikolay Denkov and Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister Mariya Gabriel announced that there is no agreement yet, but only negotiations to be finalised in the coming days. However, they confirmed that there is “agreement in principle” for Bulgaria and Romania to join Schengen by air and sea in March 2024.
Mr Dinescu, late yesterday evening, on 27 September 2023, the Romanian Prime Minister, Marcel Ciolacu, and the Romanian Ministry of the Interior announced that an agreement had been reached on 23 September 2023 between Austria, Romania and Bulgaria for Romania and Bulgaria to join the Schengen area at the land and sea borders. The “agreement” was presented as a victory and a celebration by senior government officials. How should we, ordinary citizens, treat this agreement and how does the National Union of Road Hauliers in Romania and the members of your organisation view it?
It is a welcome step forward. Although it has been expected since 2011, full accession to Schengen in 2024 seems to be happening step by step, with accession in terms of air transport coming first, with passenger data always available to air carriers. The delay obviously has absolutely no technical justification, but is only political, as the members of the EU club have decided to punish Romania and Bulgaria and reduce its competitiveness all the while also undermining its development potential.
The carriers’ expectations are now linked to the establishment of a fixed date for accession to Schengen for land borders. A clear date is essential.
What more do the two countries, the business community and civil society in Romania and Bulgaria need to do from now on to prevent the issue of Schengen accession at land borders from being postponed and to ensure that we will soon have entry at land borders as well?
Let us ask the European partners, the other members of the EU club, to tell us very clearly what they expect – clear criteria and evaluation systems to allow Schengen membership at land borders, and also a clear date.
The criteria that the other members of the EU club want Romania and Bulgaria to fulfil must not go beyond the common framework and technical conditions for access to the Schengen area.
The accession that will bring great benefit is that for lorries in particular, which should thus eliminate the huge loss of time and the great inefficiency. Today, for example, no more than one journey a week can be made between Romania and Bulgaria, due to the extremely long waiting times at the common border.
For passenger transport, non-integration into Schengen will lead to additional requirements from 2024 related to EES – Entry/Exit System and ETIAS – European Travel Information and Authorisation System.
To what extent could coordination between stakeholders in the two countries – governments, business and civil society – be the way forward from now on if coordination has been weak so far? What are the prospects for the Romanian-Bulgarian idea of a mini-Schengen in this context?
A mini-Schengen should have and could still anticipate the desire and expectations of ordinary people in Romania and Bulgaria to join Schengen, but unfortunately the border authorities in both countries seem to be doing their best to delay Schengen accession and make the most of the existing situation. On 19 December 2023, I went to Ruse to meet with the town hall and the operator of the 800-space Tir Parking Ruse, which now also runs the 140-space Pimk car park, and it was clear from talking to drivers that they were waiting around 30 hours to cross into Romania (2-3 hours to access the car park, 22 hours to park, 5 hours to cross the border), compared with 36 hours on 23 November 2023. (then they waited 3 hours to enter the car park, 26-29 hours just in the car park and another 5-6 hours to cross the border into Romania). On 19 December 2023, the queue of trucks at the exit from Romania was about 20 km.
Photo: Radu Dinescu (source: Radu Dinescu)
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