Human Rights in Central and Eastern European Countries: Towards Their Accession to the European Union
Human Rights in Central and Eastern European Countries: Towards Their Accession to the European Union

Summary/Abstract: Until the Maastricht Treaty (1992/1993) the European integration was of mostly economic nature. Maastricht Treaty extended the competences of the European Communities by including new policy areas and opened the way to political integration. Parallel with the deepening of the European integration process, with the end of the Cold war, the former communist states started the process of transformation and democratization of their national systems and proclaimed their aspirations of joining the EU. The integration of the new democracies into the European family was a historic moment and opportunity for the Union to overcome the East-West division and to promote peace and stability throughout Europe. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the understanding of the role and significance of the EU for the newly established democracies and the way it encourages important political and economic reforms in the countries engaged in the enlargement agenda.EU started to prepare itself for the forthcoming enlargement process and set out new conditions for membership- the Copenhagen criteria. The aim of this paper is to analyze the respect of human rights as one of the main prerequisites for EU membership in the case with Central and Eastern European countries accession to the EU. The paper furthermore explores human rights protection in the EU, the role of the ECJ in introducing human rights into EU proceedings, as well as the external dimension of EU human rights policy.

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