Minister of the Interior Catalin Predoiu had on Tuesday a video call with his Bulgarian counterpart Atanas Ilkov, in the wake of Predoiu’s recent meeting with Austria’s Federal Minister of the Interior Gerhard Karner, inform agerpres.ro.
„The two officials reviewed the main developments in the Schengen file and looked at the next steps related to this goal, in light of the upcoming meeting in Budapest, on November 22, of the Romanian, Hungarian, Bulgarian and Austrian Interior ministers,” the Ministry of the Interior said in a release on Tuesday.
The discussions highlighted Romania and Bulgaria’s contribution to ensuring the security of the EU’s external borders, fighting illegal migration and cross-border crime.
„Both yesterday and today’s discussions with the Austrian and Bulgarian counterparts Gerhard Karner and Atanas Ilkov were very useful and constructive in the perspective of the Schengen file. We have made progress, but the file is still in the works, no decision has been made yet. I will talk tomorrow with [Hungarian Interior] Minister Sandor Pinter, also in preparation of the meeting in Budapest. I keep in touch with all the ambassadors of EU member states accredited to Bucharest, the Dutch ambassador included. The entire ministerial team assigned to this file continues to work full throttle towards achieving the goal of becoming a Schengen member,” said Catalin Predoiu.
