Iceland's EU bid referred to the Commission

European Union foreign ministers today (27 July) unanimously referred Iceland's membership application to join the EU to the European Commission for a formal opinion. The formal application was submitted in Stockholm on 23 July.  

A senior official said that foreign ministers expected the Commission to provide its opinion, or ‘avis', before the end of the year. But Olli Rehn, the European commissioner for enlargement, warned that there would be “no shortcuts” for Iceland.  

The avis sets out an applicant country's preparedness for membership of the EU according to three broad criteria outlined by member states in Copenhagen in 1993. A country has to be a functioning democracy and market economy, and be able to implement EU legislation in the 35 policy areas, or ‘chapters', into which accession talks are divided. Iceland, as a member of the European Economic Area, has implemented two-thirds of these chapters, although not the one regulating the island's main industry, fisheries. “The distance to be covered [in the talks] is shorter though not necessarily easier,” Rehn told reporters today.

Vygaudas Ušackas, the foreign minister of Lithuania, and the first of the EU's member states to visit Iceland since the membership application was submitted, told European Voice that the toughest negotiations were likely to centre on Iceland's vast fish stocks. He was in Iceland last Saturday (25 July) for talks with the government – some reciprocation, he said, for the fact that Iceland had been the first country to recognise Lithuania's independence in 1990.  

Fishing was “not just a business” for Iceland but “a way of life”, he said. “If there is a political will from both sides, they can complete negotiations within a year-and-a-half,” Ušackas said. He acknowledged, however, that there was an “implicit understanding” among EU member states that talks should not begin before the Lisbon treaty has been ratified.  

A senior official confirmed that the Dutch had raised the issue of an agreement between Iceland and the Netherlands to reimburse Dutch accountholders with Icesave, a bank that collapsed last October. The Icelandic parliament was unable to ratify the agreement before the summer break, raising concerns that the government might try to renegotiate parts of the agreement, which would saddle Iceland's taxpayers with massive costs in years to come. Maxime Verhagen, the Dutch foreign minister, said last week (21 July) that a resolution of the Icesave question would “pave the way for Iceland's application to join the EU to be dealt with quickly” – a statement that was widely seen in Iceland as a threat.