December 30 (SeeNews) - Croatia will remove 73 checkpoints at its borders with Slovenia and Hungary as of January 1, when the country will join the EU's Schengen area of passport-free travel, prime minister Andrej Plenkovic said.
“Croatia is the first country to join both the Schengen area and the Eurozone on the same day, January 1, 2023, which will remain a transformative moment with the most specific and tangible effects on the Croatian citizens and economy,” Plenkovic said in a statement on Wednesday.
Starting January 1, Croatia will control more than 1,300 kilometres of the European Union's external border, Plenkovic added.
“With Croatia, 20 EU member states and 347 million EU citizens will share the EU's common currency. As for Schengen, this is the eighth enlargement and the first after 11 years,” the European Commission said in a press release on Friday.