抄録
With the accession of ten new members on 1 May 2004, adoption of the Constitutional Treaty by the European Council in June and its signing on 30 October, 2004, and the forthcoming decision in December to start accession negotiations with Turkey, the European Union is entering a new stage of its institutional, political and economic development. A stage of which we don't know yet where it will lead to in the medium and long term, and which presents formidable new challenges, but also opportunities. What is at stake, is more than a simple widening or deepening. It amounts to a full-fledged transformation and regime change of the Union: The quantum leap to 25, and in the foreseeable future to 27 members and more, is tantamount to a quality change. In my following remarks I shall confine myself mainly to some economic aspects, while I shall touch upon the constitutional aspects only in passing. In fact, they have been covered extensively in today's previous sessions.
