The Chair of the Committee on Ukraine’s integration into the EU emphasized this during a meeting of the Bankers' Club at the Embassy of Slovakia in Ukraine. Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze is convinced that granting Ukraine the status of a candidate for EU membership does not only open great opportunities, but also reveals large challenges: ‘We currently lack a comprehensive understanding of the scope of work at all levels — this applies not only to the Government and the Verkhovna Rada, but also to the banking sector, and the judicial system. We must not only guarantee the rule of law, courts practice and judicial decisions should also change. Therefore, it is necessary to train the corps of judges. It is necessary for everyone to understand that this is a difficult way, which requires, first of all, relevant experts’.

The Chair of the Committee informed that for three months after Ukraine received the candidate status, she has been trying to increase the capacity of the Committee on Ukraine's Integration into the EU. Unfortunately, this issue has not been resolved yet.

Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze urged to pay close attention to the requirements which supplemented granting Ukraine candidate status, as well as to demand clarity from European partners: ‘Even in these seven points, we do not see clearly what is expected from us, what we really have to do. When it comes to the fact that we must adopt a new law on the media, everyone sees it in a different way. We are waiting for the European Commission's analysis of the draft law that was adopted in the first reading — whether it corresponds to the approaches of the European Union. One should admit that everything we are doing now to fulfil these seven points is not without cunning, not without manipulation, unfortunately. I think that at some point our partners (and there are still a lot of skeptics) will look for reasons why we should not be allowed move forward to open membership negotiations’.

Another big challenge, according to Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, is the opening of EU membership negotiations. This, according to her, requires similar scope of work and similar scale of efforts as before obtaining candidate status: ‘We do not yet see a particular appetite of the part of the European Union to open these negotiations in the near future. This does not mean that the situation cannot change. We see that an unprecedented situation gives rise to unprecedented solutions. However, we should start negotiation stage as a strong country… At the moment, Ukraine does not have the institutional capacity to really move towards European integration. And we have to admit the truth’. In order to perform large-scale European integration tasks, all branches of the government at all levels, the Chair of the Committee is confident, must act in a coordinated manner: ‘It must be an interacting organism. So far, there is no such understanding’.