The European Commission considers that Ukraine already meets two of its seven recommendations for accession to the European Union (EU), relating to the judiciary and the press law, but still has “work to do” in the fight against corruption .
The recommendation was made by the community executive in a verbal update to EU officials responsible for European affairs, with Portuguese Secretary of State Tiago Antunes pointing out that “the Commission essentially concludes that progress has been made, but there is much work still to be done” after Ukraine obtained EU candidate status a year ago.
Speaking to Portuguese journalists after the informal meeting of the General Affairs Council held in Stockholm in the framework of the Swedish Presidency of the EU, the Secretary of State for European Affairs stated that “with regard to Ukraine, of the seven conditions, two deemed to be fulfilled and in the other there is some progress”.
“There is no [critério] What [a Ucrânia] does not comply, but there are two where the Commission considers that the conditions are met, namely the second recommendation, which concerns the appointment of judges, and the sixth recommendation, which concerns the media law “he explained.
already how many “Some progress has been made on the other five conditions, but there is still work to be done”said Tiago Antunes, noting that “there are major challenges in terms of anti-corruption and disengagement”.
“I would say that, in addition to the reforms in the judiciary, which have made the most progress, the issues of fighting corruption and reducing the power of the oligarchs in the economy of these countries are two of the most challenging issues.”, said the minister.
This was an interim update delivered by the European Commissioner for Neighborhood and Enlargement, Olivér Várhelyi, to relevant European ministers and at an informal meeting on enlargement.
It will be supplemented by a more regular and comprehensive report, to be released in the autumn, with information on the compliance of all candidate countries with the requirements of the community bloc.
In June 2022, EU member states made a landmark decision to grant candidate country status to Ukraine and Moldova, which have joined a larger group of countries, some of which have long been ‘queuing’ to allow to join the European bloc without any progress in recent years.
This list now includes Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey, North Macedonia, Albania, Ukraine, Moldova and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Source: DN
