The Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the EU held a hearing on the fulfilment of the political criteria for membership in the EU and NATO

The Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the EU held a hearing on the fulfilment of the political criteria for membership in the EU and NATOOn May 10, 2023, the Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the EU held a hearing “Common Agenda for the Transformation of Ukraine in Fulfilling the Political Criteria for Membership in the European Union and NATO.” Ukrainian MPs, representatives of central executive bodies and non-governmental organisations took part in the meeting. They discussed the joint efforts necessary to achieve Ukraine's ambitious goals on the path to the European and Euro-Atlantic integration.

“I would like to thank everyone for paying attention to such an important topic as the common agenda of Ukraine's transformation in fulfilling the political criteria for membership in the European Union and membership in NATO. We understand that in many ways these tasks overlap and they are essential for achieving strategic goals set out in the Constitution of Ukraine,” said the Chair of the Committee Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze. She reminded that more than 9 years ago, the ceremony of signing the political part of the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the European Union was held in Brussels. “Since that time, we have made a long way to the candidacy. We understand that the painstaking, systematic work is needed to keep this pace”, noted the Chair of the Committee. She also reminded that Ukraine signed a Charter on a Distinctive Partnership with NATO more than 25 years ago. “We have made a long way, we have additional elements of interaction. But we also understand that a serious mistake was made by the Alliance in 2008, when neither Ukraine nor Georgia received the Membership Action Plan. This paved the way for Russia's aggression, first against Georgia, and then in 2014 against Ukraine. Now we all have to focus on the Vilnius summit of the Alliance and do our utmost to move to the next level of relations between Ukraine and NATO to be able to correct the mistakes made by the Alliance in the past,” said Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze.

She noted that the members of the Parliament share the Government's opinion that the MAP is no longer a relevant procedure for Ukraine and that the path of Finland and Sweden to NATO opens new possibilities. “Ukraine is at an impressive pace developing its ability to be mutually compatible in terms of weapons... At the same time, we understand that we need to be mutually compatible at the political level as well, in order to overcome scepticism of individual member countries of the Alliance,” said the Chair of the Committee.

Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze also emphasised that in the process of European and Euro-Atlantic integration the interaction between the Parliament and the executive power is essential, as well as coordination of efforts within the legislative branch .

The Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration Olga Stefanishyna reported that the Government expects new agreements until the end of this year. At the beginning of June, a report and assessment of the European Commission on seven recommendations, which accompanied the granting of candidate status to Ukraine, is expected. “I would like to point out that it will only concern the political criteria, the political bloc, and the assessment, which will be published in October, will address Ukraine's overall readiness for membership in all 35 sections of the future membership,” said Olha Stefanishyna.

She also informed that Ukraine reached several key agreements regarding cooperation with the European Commission. “We have a clear agreement that the European Commission will not define additional tasks for Ukraine, apart from the specified seven recommendations. At the political level, we have a common understanding that the fulfilment of the seven political criteria is a window of opportunity that allows us to open negotiations on joining the EU, and we will not go beyond the tasks defined in the recommendations,” said Deputy Prime Minister Olga Stefanishina.

She called on the Parliament to adopt important draft laws in May, namely: amendments to the legislation on advertising, which were adopted by the Parliament in the first reading; draft laws on the implementation of the recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in terms of financial monitoring; amendments to the legislation regarding the procedure for selecting candidates for the positions of judges in the Constitutional Court of Ukraine. “This is an extremely important package of decisions that must be made before receiving an assessment to ensure its positive outcome. The further roadmap will depend on it,” emphasised the Deputy Prime Minister.

First Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Oleksandr Kornienko commented that the Euro-Atlantic integration of Ukraine is one of the priority tasks for the entire state and Ukrainian authorities. “On the agenda, the issues of joining the EU and NATO are organisationally and technically parallel. Regarding European integration, our main goal is the opening of the negotiation procedure. We still have a lot of work to do on the implementation of the legislation, because the 35 chapters of the negotiation procedure will require many amendments to Ukrainian laws. As for NATO, we are hoping for a very specific and defined decisions of the Vilnius summit”.

Deputy Prime Minister Olga Stefanishyna reported that Ukraine’s authorities have a sufficiently high level of readiness for the Vilnius Summit. She believes that if all political decisions are adopted, the Vilnius NATO summit has every chance of being successful. “An important transformation is an ongoing preparation of the decisions aimed at achieving full interoperability with the Alliance, both from the point of view of the defence reforms to be implemented, and from the point of view of the full military interoperability,” said Olga Stefanishyna.

The Chair of the Committee on Ukraine’s integration into the EU expressed hope for the joint, coordinated work of all branches of power on the way to the European and Euro-Atlantic integration. “We expect that we will continue efficient interaction. We will recommend to the Committee to make a decision on a common, coordinated policy with the Government regarding the political criteria for membership in NATO and in the EU. We also need a system for planning, evaluating and monitoring in relation to the Alliance. We need to develop a common platform that could coordinate our actions in European and Euro-Atlantic integration. This will enable us to move faster,” Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze said.

She also noted that while preparing these committee hearings, the Committee on Ukraine's Integration into the EU appealed to the two committees — the Committee on Foreign Policy and Inter-parliamentary Cooperation and the Committee on National Security, Defence, and Intelligence — to hold the hearing jointly. However, the initiative was not supported. Only individual members of these committees were present. “In the future, we will continue to promote a common agenda for respective committees”, said Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze.