EU expansion – A time for pride in the EU dream

NOT even the forces of anarchy, such they were, could derail the weekend celebrations to mark the entry of ten new nations to the elite EU club.

Despite official preparations for a doomsday scenario, it proved to be a gloriously sunny, joyous and largely peaceful event as Ireland, on Europe's westernmost fringes, embraced new nations on the most easterly boundaries of the continent.

To quote Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney it was truly a moment "when hope and history rhyme".