Swiss Voters To Decide On Schengen/Dublin Accords

by Ulrika Lomas, Tax-Newsc.com, Brussels

05 April 2005

The Swiss electorate will later in the year be given the opportunity to vote on Switzerland’s participation in the Schengen/Dublin accords on closer asylum and security cooperation with the European Union, which form part of nine bilateral agreements with the EU approved by parliament in December.

The referendum has been brought about after opponents of the accord with the EU handed a petition to the government containing some 86,000 signatures – well over the minimum 50,000 signatures required by Swiss law to trigger a plebiscite.

The referendum has been set for June 5.

The news comes soon after a petition against a labour accord with the ten new member states was handed to the government, which the electorate will also vote upon, on September 25.

Ueli Maurer, the president of the People's Party which has been instrumental in campaigning for a referendum on the agreements with the EU, warned that Switzerland’s security was at stake.

"Today we are more secure than most other European countries," he told reporters in Bern.

"It is obvious that the government and parliament view membership of Schengen purely as a means of removing the obstacles to EU membership," he added.

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