Reuters: EU enlargement to take place on May 4, 2004

European Union foreign ministers meeting in Brussels are reported to have decided on May 1st, 2004 as the date for the EU's enlargement to the east. Unnamed diplomats told the Reuters news agency that the Czech Republic and the nine other leading candidates for membership would probably join the EU one year after the signing of the EU accession treaty, expected in April 2003. The diplomats said the EU believed it would take the 15 member countries 12 months to ratify the treaty.