Incorporation of the Community Acquis
Incorporation of the Community Acquis : The Essen European Council (December 1994) called on the Commission to present a White Paper on the preparation of the associated countries of Central and Eastern Europe for integration into the European Union's internal market. The White Paper, which was presented at the Cannes European Council in June 1995, contained an indicative programme for the alignment of the Central and Eastern European countries' legislation with that of the internal market. It provided that these countries would establish priorities in order to incorporate the Community rules and that they would be helped in this work by a technical assistance office (TAIEX), particularly in order to obtain information on Community legislation. The incorporation and implementation of all Community legislation were the main challenges faced by the applicant countries. They required the administrations and the legal systems to be strengthened, and the infrastructure of the applicant countries to be drastically adapted to conform to Community standards, particularly on environmental questions, transport, energy and telecommunications. To facilitate these considerable adjustments, pre-accession aid was provided to the applicant countries. The accession negotiations for the applicant countries began in March 1998. The first step was to evaluate each applicant country's legislation for compatibility with the Community rules (screening process). This evaluation then constituted the basis for the second stage, bilateral negotiations between the Union and each applicant. In some areas, the applicant countries were granted transition periods between their accession and the time when they are capable of fully implementing the Community acquis. However, any such transition periods are limited in their scope and duration, and subject to very strict conditions. See: Accession criteria; Accession negotiations of the European Union; Acquis communautaire
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