Poland not singled out as EU sends final warning letters to candidate countries

By the end of the week, EU Commissioner Guenter Verheugen will send the third and last series of warning letters to the countries which will join the EU in 2004. On November 5, the European Commission expressed 39 serious warnings concerning the candidate states, out of which nine were directed at Poland. Seven of them concerned agriculture, with the biggest worry relating to the creation of the IACS IT system which will be used to calculate subsidies to be paid to Polish farmers. Verheugen assured the EU Council that he would keep it informed about developments in the candidate countries. "All EU states welcomed this information and during the discussion nobody mentioned the word "Poland"," assured Verheugen and Poland's Deputy Foreign Minister Jan Truszczyński. According to the EU Commissioner, Poland has met the required preparations in 70%, while the remaining 25% did not arouse undue fear, but 5% would be mentioned in the warning letter. (Gazeta Wyborcza, Gospodarka Supplement, p. 3) M.M.