(Brussels) The European Union officially launches negotiations on Tuesday in Luxembourg with Ukraine on the one hand, and Moldova on the other, intended to allow these two countries to one day be full members of the EU .
Russia has tried by all means to hinder this process, which promises to be long and difficult, and which should lead these two former Soviet republics to anchor themselves in Europe.
“Congratulations to Moldova and Ukraine,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on X on Tuesday. “The road will be difficult, but full of opportunities,” she added in a video message.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed the opening of these negotiations last week, welcoming the consecration of a “European dream”.
The European Union of Twenty-Seven will first formally open discussions with Ukraine on Tuesday afternoon around 3:30 p.m. (9:30 a.m. Eastern Time), then with Moldova, as part of a intergovernmental conference (IGC).
The opening of these talks is the result of a hard-won agreement by 26 EU countries, which were forced to compete in ingenuity to convince the 27th, Viktor Orban’s Hungary, not to block the process.
The Hungarian Prime Minister fiercely opposed any accession discussions with Ukraine, judging that this country was not ready. The closest EU member state to Vladimir Putin’s Russia, Hungary is also blocking all European military aid to Kyiv.
Mr. Orban finally agreed to leave the summit table of the leaders of the Twenty-Seven in December, until his 26 counterparts decided to open these accession negotiations with Kyiv and Chisinau.
Once the IGC is formally opened, negotiators will first review the legislation of the two countries to check whether it is compatible with that of the EU.
This stage, “screening” in Brussels jargon, normally lasts one to two years, a diplomatic source explained.
But in the case of Ukraine or Moldova, things will go faster, because “we already have a fairly clear idea” of the situation, underlined this European diplomat, on condition of anonymity.
However, it will take several weeks, even several months, before the different negotiation chapters are actually opened. And it is unlikely that they will be before the end of this year: Hungary, reluctant to welcome Ukraine, takes on July 1 the biannual presidency of the Council of the EU, which brings together the ministers of the Twenty-Seven .
But Budapest has so far held back the formal opening of discussions with Kyiv, judging that the conditions were not met. “If I stick to what I see here as we speak, they [the Ukrainians] are very far from meeting the accession criteria,” Hungarian Minister of European Affairs Janos Boka repeated on Tuesday in Luxembourg.
The European Commission, for its part, estimated on June 7 that Ukraine and Moldova had fulfilled all the prerequisites for such accession.
The European executive has demanded measures from Kyiv to fight corruption and the influence of oligarchs. The Commission also asked for better consideration of minorities, a measure insisted on by Budapest due to the presence of a Hungarian community in Ukraine.
The EU granted candidate status for membership to Ukraine in June 2022, in a highly symbolic gesture a few months after the start of the war unleashed by Moscow, as well as to neighboring Moldova.
The opening of negotiations is only one step in a long and arduous accession process. A possible entry into the EU of Ukraine, a country of more than 40 million inhabitants and an agricultural power, poses numerous difficulties, starting with that of the financial aid from which it should benefit.
The EU, for its part, has planned to reform itself to cope with this enlargement and improve its governance and decision-making, which is already often complex with 27 member states.
The European Union on Tuesday again extended temporary protection for some 4.2 million Ukrainian refugees until March 4, 2026.
Since March 2022, Ukrainians fleeing the war started by Russia have benefited from a status allowing them to stay, work and access aid in the EU.
“Day after day, Russia terrorizes the Ukrainian people with its bombings […] Those who fled Russian aggression can continue to count on our solidarity”, underlined the Belgian Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration, Nicole de Moor, whose country holds the six-monthly presidency of the Council of the EU.
The Temporary Protection Directive was activated by the EU on March 4, 2022, a week after the invasion of Ukraine began. This 2001 directive had never been used until then.
The EU countries hosting the most Ukrainian refugees are Germany (nearly 1.2 million), Poland (over 950,000) and the Czech Republic (over 350,000).
Adult women represent almost half of the beneficiaries of this protection, and children around a third, according to Eurostat.
