Iceland starts historic talks on EU membership
twurl.nl Iceland held its very first round of European Union membership talks on Tuesday, an event which participants on both sides labelled as historic. Iceland applied for EU membership in 2009 after the world financial crisis brought its banking sector to its knees. The EU is keen to see the island nation join, but public opinion in Iceland is sceptical about the benefits of membership. "This is a day for celebration," said Icelandic Foreign Minister Ossur Skarphedinsson after talks with the EU's enlargement commissioner, Stefan Fule, and Belgian Foreign Minister Steven Vanackere, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency. "This is indeed a historic day for the EU and a historic day for Iceland," Mr. Fule said. The talks were largely a formality, as they dealt with the general negotiating process and did not go into the specifics of the technical changes which Iceland would have to make to its laws to bring them into line with EU standards. Mr. Fule said that the commission, the EU's executive, would begin a detailed screening of Iceland's laws in November, and hopes to finish the process and identify where changes are needed by next summer. Iceland is already a member of the European Free Trade Area (EFTA)and the border—free Schengen zone, meaning that over half its laws are already broadly in line with EU norms. For more on EU enlargement: www.euractiv.com