Romania will join the Schengen Area in January 2025 after a 13-year wait. Pro-European parties won Romania’s recent elections, but far-right groups gained a 30% share of the vote, partly due to frustration over the delayed accession.
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00:00Pro-European parties won Sunday's parliamentary general elections in Romania, but far-right
00:11parties achieved a better score than never before, which is more than 30% of votes.
00:19One of the arguments used by the right-wing during the campaign was that Romanians are
00:23not respected by the EU and the delayed late accession of Romania and Bulgaria to the Schengen
00:28area was a proof of that.
00:34Since 2007, Romania is a member of the EU and in January, 13 years after the beginning
00:39of the process, it finally became a full member of the free movement area.
00:46The Schengen story was actually very used by the sovereignist parties and the far-right
00:53saying, listen, Brussels does not treat us as equal partners.
01:00And I think this also contributed to the whole general feelings against the EU.
01:06Since 2015, many member states have been temporarily closing their borders, referring to health
01:12or security reasons.
01:14Prevailing mood right now in the society is not, ha, we got it, but finally, plus some
01:20Romanians are kind of jokingly talking about saying that, well, right now Schengen zone
01:25is generally in trouble.
01:26A lot of countries are imposing border controls.
01:28It is now clear that Romania remains a pro-European country despite a massive rise of anti-EU
01:33narratives that has influenced many citizens via social media.
01:38According to Globsec, 83% of Romanians support the country's EU membership, but more than
01:4370% believe that Romania is not able to influence the EU decision mechanisms.
01:48A certain part of Romanian population feel that they are kind of second-class citizens
01:53of European Union.
01:54I think the battle is, we are disillusioned with the West because not everyone has benefited
02:00of our membership to the EU.
02:04You have people that are not living worse, but they don't feel that Romania has economical
02:09growth because we have a lot of inequalities between the classes.
02:16Now is the time for negotiations in Romania to form a government.
02:20And in the meanwhile, this Sunday, citizens will vote for the second round of the presidential
02:24elections where the ultra-nationalist anti-EU candidate Colin Georgescu had a victory on
02:29the first round.
02:30He will face the conservative pro-European Elena Lascuni.