Schengen
One element of free movement for EU citizens within the EU is to freely move across borders without border control. Schengen is a small town in Luxembourg where Germany, France and the Benelux countries (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) signed a first agreement to gradually abolishing internal border checks in 1985 and create a “Schengen Area”.
Non EU citizens who need to apply for a visa can get a Schengen Visa, which allows them to travel freely in all countries that not only signed the Schengen Convention but also implemented it. The abolishment of border control for travel within those countries is reality today.
Wikipedia provides a nice overview of the countries who actually implemented and are going to implement. The new east European members from January 2004 are supposed to implement Schengen between January and March 2008. After that date no border controls anymore while travelling to those countries coming from other Schengen countries.
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08:51PM Dec 30, 2006
by Volker Seubert in Europe & Beyond |
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