New year, new stage within the EU.
This Saturday at midnight, Croatia adopted the euro and joined the Schengen area of free movement.
The country thus said goodbye to its currency, the kuna, to become the twentieth member of the euro zone.
At the same time, it becomes the 27th state to join the Schengen area, a vast area within which more than 400 million people can travel freely without internal border controls.
Local newspapers hailed the two events, with the daily Vecernji List calling them a "crowning achievement of EU membership" for Croatia, where European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is expected to attend on Sunday. occasion.
This country, in the European Union since July 2013, declared its independence from Yugoslavia in 1991 and the conflict that followed (1991-1995) claimed some 20,000 lives.
Protecting the economy and fighting inflation
Croatian leaders regularly stress the benefits that they believe their 3.9 million compatriots will derive from joining the euro zone and the Schengen area.
Experts say the changeover to the euro will help protect the Croatian economy, one of the weakest in the EU, from soaring inflation - in November it reached 13.5% compared to 10% in the euro zone - a serious energy crisis and geopolitical insecurity since the start of Russia's invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
For the governor of the Croatian central bank (National Bank of Croatia, HNB), Boris Vujcic, the abandonment of the kuna, put into circulation in 1994, is the "only reasonable policy", while countries in Eastern Europe EU members that have not opted for the euro, such as Poland and Hungary, have proven to be even more vulnerable to inflation.
The Croats, for their part, have mixed feelings: if they generally welcome the end of border controls, the change of currency inspires mistrust.
In recent days, customers have lined up outside banks and ATMs to withdraw cash, fearing liquidity problems in the aftermath of the transition period.
Early on Sunday, the central bank governor symbolically withdrew euros from an ATM in Zagreb.
Many Croatians fear that the introduction of the euro will lead to higher prices - in particular that companies will round them up when converting.
However, nothing really changes on January 1st since everything has been calculated in euros for many years.
About 80% of bank deposits were already denominated in euros in Croatia, its main partners are in the euro zone and tourism, which constitutes 20% of its GDP, is supplied by a large European clientele.
The challenge of illegal immigration
At midnight, Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic and Slovenian Public Administration Minister Sanja Ajanovic Hovnik attended a brief ceremony at a border post during which a barrier was lifted on both sides of the border.
“Tonight, we are celebrating the New Year, the new Europe with Croatia in Schengen”, greeted Davor Bozinovic to the press, describing the event as “the final affirmation of our European identity”.
For his part, Foreign Minister Goran Grlic-Radman participated in a similar ceremony at a crossing point with another EU member, Hungary.
Croatia has welcomed four times more tourists this year than it has inhabitants and the entry into the Schengen zone will give a boost to this sector.
Long queues at its borders with its EU neighbors Slovenia and Hungary will be a thing of the past.
On Sunday, 73 border posts will close.
In airports, the change will take place on March 26, for technical reasons.
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At the same time, the situation on Croatia's borders with its non-EU neighbors - Bosnia, Montenegro and Serbia - will hardly change: it already applies the rules of the Schengen area there.
On the other hand, the repression of illegal immigration remains a major challenge.
Since joining the EU, Croatia has inherited the heavy task of protecting an external land border over 1,350 km long, most of which is shared with Bosnia.
It is on the so-called Western Balkan route used by migrants, but also by traffickers of arms, drugs and human beings.
After the ebb in clandestine crossings linked to the health crisis, Croatia registered 30,000 illegal migrants in the first ten months of 2022, an increase of 150% compared to the same period of the previous year.
