Romania’s accession to the Schengen zone is still being played out, we have five days left before the meeting of the interior ministers of the EU member states, where we need a unanimous decision on this matter, – says Dacian Ciolos, adding that Austria’s position will be decisive from now on.

“At the moment, the key to Schengen is in Vienna, in the hands of a political family of popular Europeans, which includes PNL, PMP and UDMR. The party of the Austrian Chancellor, as well as the Minister of Internal Affairs, is a member of the political family of popular Europeans,” MEP Dacian Cholos wrote on Facebook.

“I hope that President Iohannis used the opportunity provided by yesterday’s meeting in Athens of the leaders of the European People’s Party to discuss this topic with Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehhammer. We know very well that Austria has no good reason to deny us entry to Schengen,” he added.

“Diplomatic efforts, by the way, worthy of admiration, are limited by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The decision has become purely political and should be considered as such at the highest level. In addition to the internal political failures of the last decades, it is important not to find ourselves in a situation where we are used in the political interests of one or another,” Cholos said.

“I’ve been in too many negotiations to know that nothing is won until all the elements are fixed. Even if we have made progress on Sweden and the Netherlands, the nuances of their positions leave them plenty of room to manoeuvre. I know that in this process there is more and more talk about the separation of Romania from Bulgaria, and I also know that there are solutions that have been discussed and debated since the time of the government that I led in 2016, so we are by no means miss this moment,” he also wrote in the post.

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