| I. 2003 REGULAR REPORTS AND STRATEGY
PAPER
On 5th November 2003, the Commission released the 3 Regular Reports
on the progress towards accession of Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey
for 2003, accompanied by a Strategy paper.
1. Strategy Paper 2003
2. Regular Reports 2003 for each Candidate
Country
II. COUNTRY
MONITORING REPORTS AND COMPREHENSIVE MONITORING REPORT
Simultaneously with the Regular Reports, the Commission released
10 Country Monitoring Reports on the acceding countries, accompanied
by a summary Comprehensive Monitoring Report covering the main
overall findings.
1. Comprehensive Monitoring Report
2. Comprehensive Country Monitoring Reports
Background
The Copenhagen European
Council on 13th December 2002 closed the accession
negotiations with 10 countries: Cyprus,
Czech Republic,
Estonia, Hungary,
Latvia, Lithuania,
Malta, Poland,
Slovakia, Slovenia
The Presidency conclusions (paragraph 5.) read:
"Monitoring up to accession of the commitments undertaken
will give further guidance to the acceding states in their efforts
to assume responsibilities of membership and will give the necessary
assurance to current Member States. The Commission will make the
necessary proposals on the basis of the monitoring reports. Safeguard
clauses provide for measures to deal with unforeseen developments
that may arise during the first three years after accession.
The European Council welcomes furthermore the commitment to continue
the surveillance of progress with regard to economic, budgetary
and structural policies in the candidate States within the existing
economic policy co-ordination processes." The Commission
has monitored progress by the acceding countries over a number
of years; it has regularly reported its findings to the Council
during 2003, and has written to the acceding countries to signal
issues of concern. In doing so, the Commission has given further
guidance to the acceding states in their efforts to assume the
responsibilities of membership and has given the necessary assurance
to current Member States. The Comprehensive Monitoring Reports
are a final, public, overall report on the state of preparations
for membership.
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