History of the European Union since 2004 the decision on 31 March 2010 to abolish the Western European Union. In 2007, the fifth enlargement completed with the accession of Romania and Bulgaria on 1 January. 53 MEPs joined the Parliament along with two commissioners, for which two new posts were created in the Commission. The post created for the Romanian Commissioner was Multilingualism, which was criticised by some for its narrow scope. Negotiating process with Croatia as an official candidate country had been stalled for 10 months due to Slovenia's blockade of Croatia's EU accession, which was lifted in September 2009 after an agreement. Croatia has since
2004 enlargement of the European Union 2004 enlargement of the European Union The 2004 enlargement of the European Union was the largest single expansion of the European Union (EU), in terms of territory, number of states, and population to date; however, it was not the largest in terms of gross domestic product. It occurred on 1 May 2004. The simultaneous accessions concerned the following countries (sometimes referred to as the "A10" countries): Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia. Seven of these were part of the former Eastern Bloc (of which three were from the former Soviet Union and four