EU sees Ukraine’s readiness to move forward on path to accession – EPP President

The European Union is aware of the existing challenges and problems as Ukraine is striving to become member of the bloc but Brussels sees Ukraine’s willingness to proceed with reforms.

That’s according to MEP Manfred Weber, President of the European People’s Party, who spoke at a briefing in Kyiv.

“What we see, also in the European Commission’s assessment, is that Ukraine managed to finalize the precondition for the enlargement talks,” Weber said, adding that, on the other hand, every country walking the path to the accession, still has a lot to do to arrive to a position of a functioning democracy, to a “rule-of-law country, to a separation of power, to fight against corruption.”

Weber noted that the EU sees Kyiv’s “readiness to move forward” as authorities in Kyiv “understand that all these issues will be checked and assessed further” in the process of enlargement talks.

“So we will go hand in hand in the upcoming weeks,” Weber concluded, noting that he is aware of the existing challenges.

As reported earlier, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Ukraine “brought the European Union out of the ‘non-enlargement coma’”.

As a historical power, the EU was in a coma. As a common market, as a kingdom of peace, it was in a lively, normal state, but as a driving force of history, it was in a coma, into which it drove itself by the so-called phenomenon of ‘expansion fatigue,’” said the head of the Foreign Ministry, he said.