If you are to believe the growing Euro sceptics and the economic doomsayers, the European Union (EU) is a failed political and economic experiment. However, that is far from being the truth. Yes, it has its issues, but its future is bright and assured.
That is the view of the people and government of Croatia, who, yesterday, became the newest member of the bloc. The EU now ties 28 countries in a political, social, commercial and fiscal federation. While the bloc is in the grips of recession, Croatia still relies on it for 60 per cent of its national trade. Staying out as an independent unit simply made no sense.
The Zagreb government will be quick to remove its customs posts, open its borders to visa-free travel for all Europeans and align its social welfare and development programmes in line with the EU Commission in Brussels and the EU parliament in Strasburg.
As a former member of Yugoslavia that broke away in war, it now readily and peacefully joins another bloc after a ten-year process, It is just too bad that Turkey’s application for the EU has been stalled for the past three decades.
