Key issues such as the free movement of workers in an enlarged Europe will come under scrutiny at an informal EU foreign ministers' meeting this weekend, with a concrete date for enlargement as the prize if they can agree.
The group of 15 nations is divided over whether citizens of the applicant countries from eastern and southern Europe should be allowed freely to seek jobs in the EU from the date they join or only after a lengthy transition period.
Germany and Austria are calling for a seven-year transition as they fear a wave of cheap labour from their economically less developed neighbours. Sweden and Spain side with the 13 candidate states, saying they should enter on an equal footing with other EU members.
"Now we have the really difficult issues on the table," Swedish foreign minister Ms Anna Lindh told a news conference in the small Swedish town of Nykoping south of Stockholm on the eve of the meeting.
The free movement of persons is the crucial issue on the agenda. Reaching a common negotiating position on the issue would help the current holders of the EU presidency, Sweden, realise its ambition of announcing a more precise date for European Union enlargement at next month's summit in Gothenburg.
The European Union has said it would gladly see new member states in time for European Parliament elections in 2004, but has refrained from being more specific.