Enlargement of the European Union

A stylised column from which leaves sprout upwards, the new growth representing the enlargement of the European Union while the column itself symbolises the foundation for that growth. The letters "EU" appear within the column. Along the upper rim the year "2004" is struck, with the design surrounded by twelve stars and the year.

On 1 May 2004, the European Union carried out the largest enlargement in its history to that point: ten new member states joined simultaneously — including Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, the Baltic states and Malta. This expanded the EU from 15 to 25 members and extended it deep into what had formerly been Eastern Europe. The enlargement was the result of a long rapprochement process that began after the end of the Cold War and was based on the principle that European democracies with functioning market economies that met the so-called Copenhagen criteria could join the Union. For many of the new member states, accession meant not only economic integration but also a symbolic return to a united Europe after decades of division.

Finland, itself an EU member only since 1995, marked the 2004 EU eastern enlargement with its own commemorative coin — one of the few occasions on which a member country foregrounded not a national theme but a pan-European event. For Finland, the enlargement also carried a geopolitical dimension: as a neighbour of Russia and a former Cold War border state, it benefited from a more stable and broader European community. The 2004 issue thus marks both a historic date in the history of European integration and Finland's active role in shaping an enlarged Union.