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Bulgaria Invited to Step into NATO

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer has expressed his utter satisfaction with the upcoming accession of Bulgaria into NATO.

Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Bulgaria were initially expected to join NATO at a flag-raising ceremony in Istanbul at the end of June, taking the defense alliance from 19 to 26 members.

However, it became possible that this enlargement, which will extend the 54-year-old Alliance's land-link to its furthest eastern member Turkey, become a fact two months earlier.

NATO's first wave of eastward expansion came in 1999 when Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic joined.

The seven nations' flags will be raised solemnly next to those of the 19 existing members at a foreign ministers' meeting in Brussels on April 2.

NATO will admit the seven new members one month before the European Union includes 10 more countries.