EUROFILE

TODAY marks a 100 days to Cyprus’ accession to the European Union on May 1 2004; the country’s biggest event since its independence in 1960. As the European Commission prepares for the union’s biggest enlargement to date, from 15 to 25 member states, 75 million people (from the 10 acceding countries) are left pondering what exactly it means to become a EU citizen?

Over the next 100 days, the Cyprus Mail will provide a fact a day on the practical effects of EU membership, from the sublime to the ridiculous.

Fact of the day: EU membership provides Cypriot students with the opportunity to study at any university within the union at home student prices. Families will no longer have to dish out huge amounts (around £8,000 a year, depending on the course) to educate their children, as Cypriot students will cease to be ‘overseas students’ from May 1.

After accession, Cypriots will be termed European students and as such pay university fees equal to those for home students.

Since the majority of Cypriots seeking higher education end up on the windswept shores of the United Kingdom, students should expect to be charged £1-3,000 a year for academic fees, depending on the university of choice and the outcome of Prime Minister Tony Blair’s fight for top-up fees in the Commons on January 27.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.