Ukraine and EU push to start membership talks in June
Ukraine and EU push to start membership talks in June
Hungary faces renewed pressure to drop its opposition to Kyiv’s accession bid.
Hungary faces renewed pressure to drop its opposition to Kyiv’s accession bid.
Brussels officials are pushing to begin formal negotiations over Ukraine joining the European Union as early as next month, according to people familiar with the matter.
Behind the scenes, diplomats from the EU and from Kyiv are working intensively to try to persuade the Hungarian government to give its approval to opening talks on Ukraine’s accession.
Five diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the aim is to kickstart the formal negotiations as soon as June 25.
While they're at it, they should expel Hungary.
Orban's fascist regime and its love for Putin and the Trump cult is antithetical to the principles of peace and international cooperation that the EU is supposed to be about.
Throw in Turkey too.
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Great idea! Let's also expel Italy with its fascist government, or France where the nazi woman got 40+% of the votes last time, or the Dutch and their largest faction in their parliament that happens to be far right. Shall I continue?
That's not the same thing at all. In spite of recent elections, all three of those countries are still generally free societies currently occupied by fascist politicians.
They're liberal (in the original sense of the word, not the neoliberal ideology that started in the late 70s/early 80s and is now the main form of capitalism) systems currently captured by illiberal people who may lose power and influence come the next election.
Not so for Orban's Hungary. The entire Hungarian government apparatus is fascist in both form and function. Orban literally CAN'T be replaced since his party controls the mechanisms for doing so, just like his buddy Putin and his party in Russia.
So if they were formally accepted, would all of Europe join in the war directly since Russia would now be at war with Europe?
No, all territorial disputes must be settled before EU assimilation.
Cyprus might beg to differ...
Makes sense.
Starting membership talks means the EU and the country hammering out what laws the country needs to change in order to align with EU regulations.
That means going over the whole UA legal code with a fine tooth comb.
Then about the organizational changes in the government and legal systems to enshrine the new laws, allowing companies time to adapt. Etc etc.
The whole process takes years if not decades. So of the war is still ongoing by then it would be an issue. But I think everyone expects it to be over by then.
Ukraine is keeping one eye on the war and the other on the future. This is why they are so reluctant to draft the young men ( 18 - 27 year olds). Just like most former Soviet states the countries have very big dents in their population pyramids stemming from WW2, the holodomor and Soviet policies. This hurts economic growth tremendously and compounds over time.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Brussels officials are pushing to begin formal negotiations over Ukraine joining the European Union as early as next month, according to people familiar with the matter.
Behind the scenes, diplomats from the EU and from Kyiv are working intensively to try to persuade the Hungarian government to give its approval to opening talks on Ukraine’s accession.
Opening the talks would bring a morale boost to Ukraine, which has been fighting a full-scale Russian invasion for more than two years and has long aspired to join the Western bloc.
EU leaders told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last December they wanted Ukraine and Moldova to join their club, potentially bringing its membership to 29 countries.
After EU leaders gave Kyiv a political thumbs-up, the next step in the accession process is to start formal talks via an intergovernmental conference with Ukraine.
Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orbán has been the biggest internal obstacle to the EU’s ongoing support for Ukraine over the past two years.
The original article contains 686 words, the summary contains 162 words. Saved 76%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!