Ukraine, the path to the European Union. Ursula van der Leyen, Application for Admission to Ukraine: General Level “27” Will Be a Challenge

President of the European Commission in Kiev on Saturday Ursula van der Leyen Met with the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zhelensky. The talks focused mainly on Ukraine’s application to join the European Union. The European Commission is expected to issue a statement soon, based on discussions at the EU summit in Brussels in June. The decision in this case must be unanimous.

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– Creating a common position in the Council of Europe that reflects the scale of this historic decision will be a challenge. When we look back in 20 years, I hope we can say that we did the right thing. Ukraine Has achieved a lot in the last 10 years and still has a lot to do. Our opinion reflects that exactly. Way to go EU Is well known. It is based on achievements, Van der Leyen told reporters on his return from a visit to Ukraine.

Van der Leyen spent most of his time in Kiev talking face to face with Zhelensky. He also met with the Prime Minister of Ukraine Denis Schmidt. On Saturday afternoon, he went to a military hospital in Kiev, where he met with wounded soldiers. Before leaving the city, he also visited the stadium in Kiev.

Talks with Zelensky primarily evaluated Ukraine’s application for EU membership. However, EU countries are divided on this issue. On the one hand there is the “suspicious” camp with the Netherlands. BelgiumSweden, Denmark And Portugal. On the other side of the embargo are countries with a positive attitude towards granting EU candidate status to Ukraine. These are the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, including Poland, but FinlandItaly, Spain or Greece.

European Commission Announces that it is trying to reach a compromise in this matter.

When evaluating Ukraine’s application, the EC hopes to take into account how positive this country has become over the past 10 years. He considers the evaluation of Ukraine’s application to be comprehensive because he prefers countries that make decisions that face difficult arguments. At the same time, he insists that war may not be an excuse for Ukraine, but that it must be taken into account when meeting certain criteria for the process of joining the EU.

In this context, the European Commission refers, among other things, to the development of digitization as a weapon in the fight against corruption. According to EU officials, Ukraine has made significant progress in the fight against corruption, according to international rankings. The Election Commission is also drawing attention to the regression of the administration in the face of Russian occupation.

Talks with Zelensky were also concerned with the reconstruction of Ukraine after the war. In this context, EC refers not only to EU countries, but also to external partners, primarily the United States and England. Van der Leyen stressed the need to include reforms in the reconstruction plan, including energy change.

The talks also focused on issues related to grain exports from Ukraine. After Russia blocked the Black Sea ports, Ukrainian pits contained 20 million tons of grain that could not be exported from the country. Yield is expected to be 60 million tonnes in the current season. Therefore, exports should be around 5 million tonnes per month so that warehouses can continue to be filled, which is currently several times less. Zelenskiy should inform the head of the European Commission about possible new ways of exporting agricultural products from Ukraine, including water canals to Romania. There is still work going on in this regard.