{"id":13414,"date":"2023-12-31T01:53:32","date_gmt":"2023-12-31T01:53:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2023\/12\/31\/bulgaria-and-romania-join-schengen-area-for-maritime-and-air-passengers\/"},"modified":"2023-12-31T01:53:32","modified_gmt":"2023-12-31T01:53:32","slug":"bulgaria-and-romania-join-schengen-area-for-maritime-and-air-passengers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2023\/12\/31\/bulgaria-and-romania-join-schengen-area-for-maritime-and-air-passengers\/","title":{"rendered":"Bulgaria and Romania join Schengen area for maritime and air passengers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      The European Council has decided to enlarge the border-free Schengen area to include Bulgaria and Romania, the council\u2019s Spanish presidency said Saturday.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      Controls on air and sea borders will be lifted as of March 2024, and discussions on lifting controls at land borders will continue in the new year, according to a statement by the European Commission.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      \u201cAn enlarged Schengen area will make the EU stronger as a Union, internally and on the global stage,\u201d the commission said, welcoming both countries.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      The Schengen area currently offers unrestricted travel within a territory of 26 countries (of which 22 are EU countries), and includes more than 400 million citizens, making it the largest area of free movement in the world, according to the Commission.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      The decision to add Bulgaria and Romania was unanimously approved by the European Council, the commission also said, noting that it had sent multiple \u201cfact-finding missions\u201d in 2022 and 2023 to the countries\u2019 external borders to confirm their readiness to join Schengen.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      European Council President Charles Michel sent his congratulations to Romania and Bulgaria via X, calling it \u201ca long awaited step for Romanian and Bulgarian citizens to enjoy easier freedom of movement with the perspective of land transport to come.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      European Commission President\u00a0Ursula\u00a0von der Leyen\u00a0described the decision as\u00a0\u201ca historic moment for Bulgaria and Romania. And a day of great pride for Romanian and Bulgarian citizens\u2026 This is a major step forward for both countries and for the Schengen area as a whole.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      Romania and Bulgaria also hailed the decision, with Romanian Foreign Minister\u00a0Luminita Odobescu writing on X, that it is \u201can important outcome for Romania\u2019s citizens. Our thanks to all EU partners and institutions for the support. Romania remains committed to a strong and secure Schengen area.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      Romanian President Klaus Iohannis echoed his foreign minister\u2019s comments, saying on X, it \u201cis a an important step for the benefit of the Romanian people.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">      Meanwhile Bulgaria\u2019s Foreign Minister Mariya Gabriel posted on X that \u201ctoday Schengen becomes stronger with Bulgaria and Romania.\u201d  <\/p>\n\n<div>This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The European Council has decided to enlarge the border-free Schengen area to include Bulgaria and Romania, the council\u2019s Spanish presidency said Saturday. Controls on air and sea borders will be lifted as of March 2024, and discussions on lifting controls at land borders will continue in the new year, according to a statement by the <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":13415,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-13414","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13414\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}