CROATIA: EU officials and leaders arrive in Zagreb to attend Croatia's entry into the EU, 22 years after independence triggered war

Record ID: 858832

  • Title: CROATIA: EU officials and leaders arrive in Zagreb to attend Croatia's entry into the EU, 22 years after independence triggered war
  • Date: 30th June 2013
  • Summary: ZAGREB, CROATIA (JUNE 30, 2013) (REUTERS) MEMBERS OF THE YOUNG EUROPEAN MOVEMENTS (YEM) HOLDING A ROPE WITH EU MEMBER STATES FLAGS YEM MEMBERS WALKING IN CENTRAL ZAGREB YEM MEMBERS POSING FOR PHOTO (SOUNDBITE) (English) MEMBER OF THE YOUNG EUROPEAN MOVEMENT, SEBASTIAN LANG, SAYING: "We are Croatians, Germans, French and now this is the end of our travel and we want to welcome Croatia into the EU." YOUNG WOMAN HOLDING BANNER READING (English): "HUG ME I AM EUROPEAN" MEMBER OF YOUNG EUROPEAN MOVEMENT KISSING YOUNG MAN IN A CAFE, PEOPLE APPLAUDING YEM MEMBERS WALKING IN STREET
  • Embargoed: 15th July 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Croatia
  • City:
  • Country: Croatia
  • Topics: International Relations,Economy,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVAE9WUTLH3JW3NIYW8OWWDDBO7U
  • Aspect Ratio:
  • Story Text: European Union officials and leaders arrived in Croatia's capital Zagreb on Sunday (June 30) to attend the official ceremony of Croatia's accession to the EU.
    Croatia becomes the 28th member of the European Union at midnight on Sunday, passing a milestone in its recovery from war but anxious over the troubled state of its economy and the bloc it is joining.
    Croatia joins the bloc just over two decades after declaring independence from federal Yugoslavia, a step that triggered four years of war in which some 20,000 people died.
    Facing a fifth year of recession and record unemployment of 21 percent, few Croatians are in the mood to party.
    The EU is mired in its own economic woes, which have created internal divisions and undermined popular support for the union.
    Among some 170 foreign dignitaries who arrived to mark the occasion was a strong European Union delegation, including President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso, President of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy and President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz.
    The meeting will also be used to pass the post of the six-month EU Presidency from Ireland to Lithuania, with the countries represented by Ireland's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Eamon Gilmore and President of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaite.
    Members of the Young European Movement, a Pan-European youth organisation, welcomed young Croatians into the EU by kissing and hugging them on the street cafes of Zagreb on Sunday.

    "We are Croatians, Germans, French and now this is the end of our travel and we want to welcome Croatia into the EU," said Sebastian Lang, a member of the movement.
    The country of 4.4 million people, with a coastline that attracts 10 million tourists each year, is one of seven that emerged from the ashes of Yugoslavia during a decade of war in the 1990s.
    Slovenia was first to join the EU, in 2004. Serbia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Kosovo are still years away.
    Croatia has gone through seven years of tortuous and often unpopular EU-guided reform.
    It has handed over more than a dozen Croatian and Bosnian Croat military and political leaders charged with war crimes to the United Nations tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague.
    It has sold shipyards, steeped in history and tradition but deep in debt, and launched a fight against corruption that saw former prime minister Ivo Sanader jailed.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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