Adrian Nastase Prime Minister

When Iraq set off an international crisis by invading Kuwait in 1990, the UN Security Council had to take difficult decisions. Romania was then presiding over the Council and was able to make “a significant contribution,” recalls Prime Minister Adrian Nastase, then Romanian Foreign Minister.
Romania is now in the leading ranks of the countries seeking to become full-fledged members of NATO, and is confident that it will receive a formal invitation to join at next year’s summit, in Prague.
That will be good not only for Romania, but also for NATO, says Dr. Nastase, a former professor of International Law. “For the United States and the Alliance it is important to have Romania in the Trans-Atlantic family,” he says, due to the country’s “very special significance in geo-strategic terms.”

“The U.S. should have a more significant role in the Romanian economy”

In contrast to much of the rest of Southeastern Europe, “in Romania there is a very stable situation” as shown by the current “economic growth, the social climate and the new investments coming in.” As a result, says Dr. Nastase, “we can be an excellent player in this region,”
The prospects for early membership are good, he feels. “Our relations in the last few years with NATO, our dealings with the IMF and the World Bank, our negotiations with the European Union–all these are very significant steps toward Romania’s future membership.”
In fact, the Bush administration is actively backing Romania’s NATO candidacy, and formal admission to the Atlantic Alliance (probably in 2004) will certainly do no harm to the country’s prospects for entering the EU a couple of years later, perhaps in 2006 or 2007.

Mircea Geoana Foreign Minister

The Foreign Minister, Mircea Geoana, has no doubts about it: “Romania’s time has come”, he says. “It is no longer a question of if but when Romania will join NATO and the EU. The Romanian Government is taking positive actions to achieve these goals sooner rather than later,” he adds.
“The reality is that Romania is already part of the West. Romania has regained the West, it has come back to where it belongs,” he explains. “In the West everyone already accepts that we are part of their Trans-Atlantic family.”
The only real debate now, says Mr. Geoana, is “what kind of Romania will be inside NATO and the EU? What kind of specific role will it have? The issue is not if or when but how. The quality of our integration is what really matters to us.”

One important factor is the relationship with the U.S., which Mr. Geoana, a former ambassador to Washington, sees as building on the “strategic partnership” initiated during President Clinton’s visit to Romania in 1997.
This bilateral partnership should go beyond security matters, the minister feels. “We want this strategic relationship to bring some results especially on the economic and investment side,” he says. The U.S. should view Romania “as a place worth considering for investment. We would like to see the U.S. investing more. We sense that the U.S. can and should have a significant role in this economy.”