ENLARGEMENT: COMMISSION PROMISES ACTION PLAN TO PREPARE CANDIDATES.

Europe-East, November, 2001

The European Commission is introducing a new action plan to help the candidate countries bring their administrative and judicial capacity up to EU standards in time for accession of as many as ten of them by 2004. This is the major novelty in the annual package of assessments on the progress of each of the 13 countries, and the Commission's Enlargement Strategy Paper, published on November 13.

The action plan, backed by "up to Euro 250 million in 2002", is a response to frequently-remarked gaps in the candidates' preparations for putting the EU acquis into effect - particularly in the sensitive area of justice and home affairs, with its strongly political character. Delays, deficiencies in training and personnel, defects in procedure, and insufficient efforts to...

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