Our country welcomes Croatia’s entry into the European Union on July 1, 2013. As is known, the accession treaty signed allows Greece to introduce transitional restrictions on the free movement of workers from Croatia. In this context, I would like to inform you that we will implement these measures initially for two years, as we have done in every enlargement process so far, stated in a statement by Assistant Minister Nikolaos Panagiotopoulos.
Transitional restrictions on the employment of Croatian workers have been introduced by 11 member states before Greece – France, Germany, the Netherlands, Cyprus, Austria, the United Kingdom, Slovenia, Belgium, Spain, Luxembourg, and Malta.
Restrictions will not be introduced by Portugal, Poland, Sweden, Romania, Hungary, Ireland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia. It is still unknown what Italy and Bulgaria have decided.
The Croatian accession treaty provides for the possibility of a transitional period, during which EU member states can introduce restrictions on the employment of Croatian workers according to the formula 2+3+2, which means that the initial restriction for access to the labor market of two years can be extended by member states for another three years after a review and for an additional two years with a justified reason. The same rules applied to all new members that joined the EU in 2004 and 2007.
The Croatian government adopted a regulation on June 26 that introduces the same restrictions for workers from EU member states that have restricted access to their labor markets for Croatian workers.
