Czechs celebrate Schengen entry

Czechs are celebrating the country’s entry to the Schengen border-free zone with fireworks, street parties, concerts and sports events. The eastward expansion of Schengen to nine new states at midnight on Thursday will lift border controls between the old and new EU members, creating a vast border-free zone for 400 million Europeans in 24 countries stretching from Spain to Estonia. The expansion is described as a symbolic “tearing down of the last remnants of the Iron Curtain”.