On 12 June 1985, in Madrid, Spain and Portugal sign the Treaty of Accession to the European Communities — the act opening the path to Iberian membership on 1 January 1986.

Accession talks, begun in the early 1980s after the democratic transitions, set transitional periods for agriculture, fisheries and free movement of persons. The treaty was ratified by all member states and by Spain and Portugal.

Accession meant access to the single market, structural funds and consolidation of post-dictatorship democracies on the European axis.

For the EEC, 12 June 1985 marks the third enlargement, after the UK/Denmark/Ireland (1973) and Greece (1981).

The official text appears in the Official Journal of the European Communities and on EUR-Lex.

The Accession Treaty of 12 June 1985 remains the act that brought the Iberian Peninsula into the European Communities.

The Madrid signing closed a decade of negotiations and set the entry-into-force calendar for 1 January 1986.

Image: Madrid; Wikimedia Commons. Cropped to 16:9.

Source consulted: Treaty of Accession 1985. Treaty text: Treaty of Accession 1985 (EUR-Lex / OJ L 302).