Croatia's treaty of accession with the European Union will be signed this December, after parliamentary elections in Croatia if they are to be held on 4 December, and the place and the exact date of the treaty-signing ceremony have not yet been determined, a source in the Polish presidency of the European Union told press on Wednesday.
The EU Committee of Permanent Representatives (COREPER) on Wednesday approved an English-language version of the treaty on Croatia's accession to the EU. Now that the English-language version has been approved, the document is to be translated into Croatian and all official EU languages. The translation and redaction should be completed by the end of October so that the treaty could be put on the agenda of the European Parliament that has to greenlight the document before its signing.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk will personally bring the draft document to Zagreb on Friday or on Saturday morning, the same source said.
The European Parliament can vote on the treaty on 1 December and after that the Council of the EU should give its consent. The first next meeting of the Council of the EU is scheduled for 5 December, which means that the signing of the treaty is possible after that, according to the source from the Polish EU chairmanship.
The document may be inked on 9 December when a European Union summit meeting is scheduled to take place in Brussels.
The 356-page English-language version of the treaty reads that the date of Croatia's admission to the European bloc is 1 July 2013.
After the signing, the treaty has to be ratified in all EU member-states and in Croatia which is to organise a referendum on this topic within 30 after the signing of the document.
