ABSTRACT
In February 1991 Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland agreed to co-ordinate their approach to the European Community at a meeting in Visegrad (Hungary) to further the aim of eventual full membership. The three agreed, for example, to form a free trade zone as a way of gaining entry into the EC. On 23 September 1992, however, Hungary and Poland decided to form a free trade zone on their own by the start of 1993, while attempting separate arrangements with the two halves of Czechoslovakia at a later stage (Nicholas Denton, FT, 24 September 1992, p. 6). The first in the series of meetings between the Visegrad three and the EC took place on 28 October 1992. One result was an attempt to specify the entry criteria before December 1992. Just before Christmas 1992 Hungary, Poland and representatives of the soon-to-be independent Czech and Slovak republics signed a free trade agreement linking the Visegrad four (Anthony Robinson, FT, 30 December 1992, p. 8).
