Central and eastern European countries have been and still are adapting their legal framework to the requirements of a Western market economy and the body of EU legislation, the acquis communautaire. As the harmonisation of the national legal framework to EU standards is one of the yardsticks...

In the Baltic States, the process of independence started after the elections in spring 1990 and was completed by August 1991. Fifty-one years after being forced to join the Soviet Union, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania each regained their independence and became once again part of the western...