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The European Union's executive arm is likely to recommend this month that Bulgaria and Romania join next January rather than in 2008, but propose tough conditions for their entry, an EU source said Tuesday.

The European Commission will make the recommendation on September 26 and the 25 EU member states are likely to give the final green light in October for the bloc's second enlargement wave into ex-communist eastern Europe.

But the two Balkan countries may be excluded initially from some EU policies in areas where they are not fully prepared for membership, such as the fight against corruption and organized crime, which is a worry especially in Bulgaria.

"A serious option is to let the countries join the EU next year, but with safeguards," a commission official said, asking not to be named.

Commission spokeswoman Krisztina Nagy said no decision has been made on when the two countries would join the bloc.

"We are in the final stage of preparing a report, but it is too early to draw any conclusions, so any speculation is premature," Nagy said.

Prospects for an early accession date rose when EU President Finland's Prime Minister, Matti Vanhanen, said after talks with his Romanian counterpart Tuesday he was confident Bucharest had made clear progress towards EU entry in 2007.

Vanhanen also promised to open the Finnish labor market to workers from Bulgaria and Romania once they join the EU, the first such declaration from a member state.

The issue has became sensitive in Britain since official figures last month showed hundreds of thousands of workers from Poland and other new members have flooded the British labor market since the bloc's eastward enlargement in 2004.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso was to discuss the terms of Bulgaria's accession with Bulgarian Prime Minister Sergey Stanishev in Strasbourg Tuesday.

Last week, Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn warned Sofia it still needed progress in fighting organized crime and sleaze.

Under the accession treaty, which the Black Sea neighbors signed last year, either country could be delayed by a year from 2007 if it is deemed not ready to join, or excluded for some time from some EU policies for which it was unprepared.

The Financial Times said Tuesday that Bulgaria will come under tougher EU scrutiny for its shortcomings in handling fraud and organized crime and could face financial sanctions.

A commission source said the amount of EU aid is fixed by the accession treaty and it is difficult to strip countries. But aid could be withheld if the countries' payments agencies to distribute farm subsidies are deemed not ready.

(China Daily September 6, 2006)