European expansion

The European Union expanded on January 1. Bulgaria and Romania are now part of it and Europe stretches to the Black Sea. This is a remarkable feat of expansion. It brings some of the Balkans into a European political, economic and military alliance for the first time since the Roman Empire. Russia, which always had interests in the Balkans and long dominated the area, is now contained. The other Balkan countries, Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo, for instance, remain outside looking in. How this present expansion effects their incorporation into the EU remains up in the air.