Croatia's EU entry and the accession of Bulgaria and Romania to the Schengen area will be among the priorities of Hungary's Presidency of the European Union in the first half of 2011, a Hungarian government official said in an interview with European media ahead of a meeting between Hungarian government officials and the European Commission scheduled for Wednesday.
Hungary shares a long border with Croatia and may benefit a lot from Croatia's entry into the EU. Also, several thousand ethnic Hungarians live in Croatia.
Although Croatia has closed most of the policy chapters in its negotiations with the European Commission, a lot of work remains to be done, and there is also opposition to enlargement from some member states, such as the Netherlands, with which Hungary has already intensified contacts, the Hungarian official said.
Budapest hopes to close all negotiation chapters with Zagreb during its presidency, in which case the Council of the European Union could decide on an accession date in June.
The official said that the accession of Bulgaria and Romania to the Schengen area, planned for March 2011, would most likely be delayed, but added that the Hungarian EU Presidency would try to facilitate the accession of the two countries to the area of free movement within the Union.
He said that Hungary would push for granting membership candidate status to Montenegro and for opening accession negotiations with Macedonia.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and members of his Cabinet are meeting with European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso on Wednesday to formally present the priorities of Hungary as the next president of the European Union.
