Romania Refuses to Join Trade Plan for Comecon

Romania, deepening its isolation from its communist allies, Thursday refused to join them in a plan to create an integrated market within the 10-nation Comecon trade alliance.

The plan was agreed at a three-day meeting of Comecon prime ministers that ended in Prague amid indications of discord.

A communique issued after the meeting listed the nine Comecon member states that had agreed to the gradual creation of a common market, but omitted the name of Romania. The document did not set a date for establishing the market.

Comecon, formally known as the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, is a trade alliance that groups the Soviet Union with its six Warsaw Pact allies: Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland and Romania. The group also includes Vietnam, Cuba and Mongolia.

The communique said the nations had reached an “understanding on gradually creating conditions for mutual free movement of goods, services and other production factors, with the aim to create an integrated market in the future.”

Asked why Romania had withheld its agreement, senior Romanian delegate Ion Stoian told reporters: “We have had our position for 25 years. It’s nothing new, there’s no need to agree to anything.”

Overhaul Sought

Romanian President Nicolae Ceausescu has steered a relatively independent course within the communist community since the 1960s. But in recent years, the country has become increasingly isolated within the East Bloc, refusing to bend to the mood of reform that has swept Eastern Europe since Mikhail S. Gorbachev became Soviet leader in 1985.

After a signing ceremony, Soviet Prime Minister Nikolai Ryzhkov expressed certainty to journalists that Romania would give up its opposition to an integrated market. But he said: “It will take time for them to agree this is a necessity.”

The communique called for an overhaul of Comecon and said unanimous agreement was reached on a collective production strategy for the years 1991-2005.

Hungary, one of the East Bloc’s most enthusiastic advocates of reform, emerged at the Prague session as a prime backer of overhauling Comecon, which has changed little since its creation in 1949.

Romania and East Germany, however, remain deeply suspicious of reform and say their economies have no need of change.