The European Commission has said that Ukraine should receive the status of a candidate to join the EU, in a show of confidence in the war government of Volodymyr Zelenskiy and a diplomatic blow to Vladimir Putin.
The EU executive also recommended candidate status for Moldova, another former Soviet state that launched a bid to become a member of the EU shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But he gave a more cautious response to Georgia, saying the country needed to carry out more judicial and anti-corruption reforms.
EU leaders will decide next week whether to grant the three states EU candidate status, although their full membership is likely to take years. The decision would be a historic step for Ukraine, where reformists have been seeking democratic change since the 2014 Maidan protests, events that were the prelude to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the war against it. neighbor.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Ukraine has made progress over the past eight years. He cited reforms to create a market economy, an independent judiciary and to tackle corruption, but said more needs to be done to allow Ukraine to make progress in accession talks.
“Ukraine should be welcomed as a candidate country. Understanding that a good job has been done, but there is also important work to be done,” he told reporters. “The whole process is based on merit. So it goes by the book and therefore progress depends entirely on Ukraine. It is Ukraine that has it in its hands. “
“We all know that Ukrainians are ready to die for the European perspective. We want them to live with us, the European dream,” Von der Leyen added.
Zelenskiy, the president of Ukraine, said that the EU proposal “would certainly bring our victory closer”.
Ukraine’s outcome for candidate status looks positive, following the visit of four EU leaders to meet with Zelenskiy on Thursday. “Ukraine belongs to the European family,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz told a news conference with Frenchman Emmanuel Macron, Italian Mario Draghi, Romanian Klaus Iohannis and Zelenskiy.
Joining the EU could take years. Some EU countries are hesitant to offer false hopes to Ukraine before demanding accession talks that Macron suggested could take decades to complete. The French president has called for the creation of a new European political community that will allow future and former members to deepen ties on security, energy and the movement of people.
While Paris insists that this is not a substitute for EU enlargement, Kyiv is wary of anything that could hold back the bloc’s membership.
The decision to grant a country EU candidate status is a tedious process that takes years and paves the way for talks on alignment with EU law. It took Albania more than five years to receive candidate status. Northern Macedonia became a candidate for the EU in 2005, but is still waiting to open accession talks.
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Von der Leyen said the commission also wanted EU candidate status for Moldova, which declared independence from the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and is concerned about the overwhelming effect of the Ukraine conflict. . Moldova, Von der Leyen said, was “for the first time since independence on a real path in favor of reform, anti-corruption and Europeanism.” He said his economy and public administration still needed “significant improvements”, but expressed confidence in the government.
Georgia, another post-Soviet state, should receive “a European perspective,” a step lower on the EU membership scale than candidate status, the commission said.
EU Enlargement Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi called for an end to Georgia’s political polarization, as he listed a number of reforms that Tbilisi had to carry out to gain candidate status. These included judicial reforms, the creation of an independent anti-corruption agency, the intensification of the fight against organized crime and greater protection of media freedom.