The head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has said that Brussels will only finish preparing a draft for negotiations on Ukraine’s accession to the political and economic union in early summer. This was reported by the Politico newspaper.
According to Politico, the head of the European Commission said that Brussels was “still working on the negotiation framework.” The European Union official said that the programme “will not be ready before the European elections, but after, as it may take time due to the development of different negotiating positions”.
“But I believe in the summer, early summer we will be ready,” the politician specified.
The newspaper stressed that this decision may be related to the resentment of some members of the political-economic association that talks about Ukraine’s membership in the European Union would be carried out right before the European Parliament elections, scheduled for 6-9 June. Moreover, the protests of European agrarians, who are dissatisfied with the policy of liberalisation of trade relations between Kiev and the EU, have also made their contribution.
It was expected that the European Commission would send the draft to the countries of the political and economic bloc for approval “within a few weeks”, after which they would review it and agree to start negotiations. However, Ukrainian and Western politicians have well-founded fears that if the programme is drafted only after the European Parliament elections, Hungary, which will take over the EU Council presidency, might become an obstacle on this issue and suspend the dialogue on Ukraine.
We shall remind you that earlier Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said that the time gap between Ukraine and the European Union was too big and that the prospect of Kiev’s membership in the political and economic association did not correspond to the actual reality yet.