In December 2022, Bulgaria’s accession to the Schengen Area was vetoed by Austria and the Netherlands. The Schengen Area comprises 26 European states—including four non-European Union member-states—that ensure the freedom of movement across one another’s borders and permit citizens and visitors to forgo passport checks. Initially established in connection with the European Union, the Schengen Area could be viewed as the de jure epitome of European integration; a concept that became popularized as a result of the need for reconciliation following the Second World War. It was perceived as the antidote of the ultra-nationalism that caused the war. It refers to the economic, political, social, and cultural integration of European states, under the supranational entity of the European Union, which has the ability to set particular policies and standards that reign over sovereign governments. The Schengen Area is representative of European integration, and could be viewed as an emblem of pan-European nationalism.
Bulgaria entered the European Union back in 2007, however its accession to the Schengen Area has been a controversial topic since 2011. Now over a decade ago, Bulgaria carried out a double bid, alongside Romania, and the two states were rejected by France, Germany, Sweden, Belgium and the Netherlands, “over concerns related to corruption, organised crime and judicial reforms.” The high standards for joining the Schengen Area include the upholding of common rules, the sharing of security information, police cooperation, and the management of external borders. However, it is important to note that Hungary is in the Schengen Area, a country that is arguably more corrupt than Bulgaria and is rated “partially free,” by the Freedom House, whereas Bulgaria is rated as “free.” This raises questions regarding whether corruption is truly the reason behind Bulgaria’s exclusion from the Schengen Area. The European Commission, an executive body of the European Union, has in the past voiced that the candidates have fulfilled these requirements, and the European Parliament has denounced their exclusion for being discriminatory.
Hence, it appears that the recent vetoing could largely be a result of Bulgaria’s external border with Turkey-the country that is the largest refugee host in the world, with approximately four million refugees, primarily from Syria. The lack of trust in the border security between Turkey and Bulgaria, coupled up with the anti-immigration and oftentimes xenophobic sentiment of European leaders, has resulted in it being immensely difficult for Bulgaria to be accepted into the Schengen Area.
In February of 2022, French President Emmanual Macron, said, "We must reform Schengen. There can be no freedom of movement if we do not control our external borders." The French politician is well-known globally for his stigmatization of Muslim communities in France, with him blatantly declaring that “the French identity does not include the Muslim community,” and implying that there is a clear notion of ‘us’ and ‘them’ when it comes to the French people and those who practice Islam (in spite of a nationality and a religion being two separate things), by saying, “They never respected us as French people.” Furthermore, as reported by Al Jazeera, the term used by President Macron to first describe French Muslims was “gloomy.” Given Macron’s harsh sentiment towards them, perhaps it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Muslims in France would be in a gloomy state of being.
The Islamophobic attitudes that European leaders such as Macron carry fuel negative sentiments towards Middle Eastern refugees, as demonstrated when the war in Ukraine first began and many typically anti-immigrant European nations supported and aided the acceptance of Ukrainian refugees. Hungarian leader Viktor Orban who previously referred to migration as “poison” was now welcoming his “Ukrainian friends,” and the former Bulgarian Prime Minister Kiril Petkov, perhaps shooting himself in his own foot, emphasized that,
“These are not the refugees we are used to...These people are Europeans... These people are intelligent, they are educated people...This is not the refugee wave we have been used to, people we were not sure about their identity, people with unclear pasts, who could have been even terrorists."
The popular sentiment towards Muslim refugees is largely negative, with many European states believing the influx of Middle Eastern refugees to be disruptive, dangerous, and culturally unacceptable. Hence, Bulgaria’s Schengen accession remains an issue. The Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said, following the veto, that he wanted to ensure that no one would be able to “cross the border with a 50-euro note,” colloquially dismissing Bulgarian border controls, in spite of the European Commission’s validation of Bulgaria’s adherence to the regulations. Not only is this statement reflective of the hierarchical nature of the EU, with Bulgaria being treated as a second-class member-state, it also further emphasizes the importance given to preventing the entrance of refugees.
Leaders in Bulgaria have responded by arguing that there is relatively rare cross-passing of their external borders, claiming that Austria and the Netherlands' vetoing is due to underlying domestic motivations. They claimed that it is because the two governments are aiming to earn votes from portions of the public that are anti-immigration. The Austrian government has stated that there are approximately 75,000 irregular migrants within their borders, with the EU Border Agency Frontex reporting 128,000 irregular entries into the European Union from the West Balkans in 2022.
The common path into the EU from Turkey has been crossing the Aegean Sea into Greece, on refugee boats, however, once this dangerous trek became well-known, many have reverted to instead queuing at the border gates in Edirne, Turkish city situated by Turkey’s border with Bulgaria. From 2021 to 2022, migrants and refugees who crossed the Turkey and Bulgaria border doubled, with 85,000 recorded arrivals in 2022. This influx, coupled up with the Islamophobic, xenophobic sentiment towards EU countries put a strain on Bulgaria’s Schengen accession.
Therefore, Bulgaria’s border with Turkey can be seen as a gateway for refugees into the European Union—a path that could be eased with the accession of Bulgaria into the Schengen Area. However, whether this is fueled by domestic political concerns of garnering the votes of xenophobes or whether it stems from the personal anti-immigrant and Islamaphobic natures of the leaders themselves, it is apparent that as long as the Turkish-Bulgarian border security remains ambiguous, Bulgaria’s potential accession will remain uncertain. The EU does not want to threaten their years-long safe-haven of storing millions of refugees in Turkey—a country that has neither the political nor the economic stability to maintain such high numbers of refugees. In 2021, The Guardian reported that “the European Commission wants to fund “border control” at Turkey’s eastern frontier as part of efforts to deter refugees and migrants from coming to Europe.” Turkey has for long been a mediary between Syrian refugees fleeing the war in their home country, and the European Union, and the EU is determined to keep the refugees outside of their member states.
Ultimately, in spite of some EU member states’ claims that Bulgaria’s accession is problematic due to corruption, it is apparent that the underlying motive behind the vetoing is to prevent migrants and refugees from entering the EU. The notion of pan-European nationalism and European integration is limited to certain countries—excluding much of Eastern Europe and treating them as inferior member-states, subject to internal discrimination.