It will be hard to get a visa-free regime in 2013, Dirk Schuebel

The obtaining by Moldova of a liberalized visa regime with the EU by the end of 2013 is not impossible, but is very difficult, the Head of the European Union Delegation in Chisinau Dirk Schuebel said, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. “It’s hard to say when the negotiations will be finished and when the visa-free regime will be granted. But I can say that I have a positive feeling that this will happen in the not so distant future. I can say that it will happen the next few years,” the Ambassador said in a press briefing on November 14. Dirk Schuebel stated that the obtaining of a liberalized visa regime by Moldova would mean visa-free trips to the Schengen area for a period of three consecutive months. In this period, the Moldovans will not be able to work in the states to which they will travel, except for Romania, Bulgaria, Cyprus, the UK, and Ireland. The Ambassador also said that Moldova did many things, adopted laws and they will now follow attentively how they are implemented. In the Moldova-EU relations, headway is made in the talks on the Association Agreement. According to Dirk Schuebel, the next week will be full of events because a number of meetings that will focus on Moldova will take place in Brussels. Dirk Schuebel confessed that when he came to Moldova three years ago, he didn’t believe that the country has chances of joining the European Union. Now he believes this, as other European officials. He said that in order to achieve this desideratum, Moldova should continue to make effort and to promote the initiated reforms.