European Union foreign ministers agreed today that the entry into the bloc of 10 countries in Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean will take place on May 1st, 2004, officials said.
Several of the candidate nations, notably Poland, had been pressing for their historic accession to happen on January 1st, 2004.
But officials said the foreign ministers of the 15-nation bloc agreed on the later date of May 1st to give all 25 countries concerned more time to ratify the accession treaty - which is expected to run to more than 6,000 pages.
The timetable for the entry of Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia is now fixed.
They will be formally invited to join at a December 12-13th summit in Copenhagen. On April 16th, 2003, they will sign the accession treaty in Athens. The document will then be put to national referendums in several countries prior to enlargement on May 1st, 2004.
The EU had limited itself before to saying that the aspirant nations should be through the door by the time of the next European Parliament elections in June 2004.
The candidates will enjoy a financial spin-off from the four-month delay in their accession.
Under EU budgetary rules, they will pay less in monthly EU contributions by joining in May rather than January, but will still receive the full annual amount of catch-up aid.
In the meantime, however, an inter-governmental conference (IGC) is planned for 2003 at which a new EU treaty will be hammered out.
Polish Foreign Minister Mr Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz said: "Under some conditions, we can accept a short postponement of the [entry] date".
He said the conditions included full voting rights in the next IGC, participation in the 2004 European Parliament elections, and appropriate budgetary compensation.
The IGC will convene after former French president Mr Valery Giscard d'Estaing's convention examining the future of Europe ends its work, probably in mid-2003.
The IGC will be tasked with drafting a new EU treaty to succeed the Nice Treaty hammered out in marathon negotiations at the end of 2000.
The EU foreign ministers agreed that the candidates will participate as full members of the IGC, despite not being formal members of the bloc for another year, according to the officials.
The Nice Treaty laid out essential reforms to prevent EU decision-making being paralysed by its new, bigger membership. Under the treaty, the EU's executive Commission is meant to have only one representative of each country.
The foreign ministers agreed that from May to November 2004, the Commission will increase by 10 to 30 members, adding one commissioner for each of the new member states. From November, it will go down to 25 members, one for each country.
The present commission led by Mr Romano Prodi has 20 members, two each from the bigger powers (Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain) and one each from the rest.
AFP