Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitro Kuleb said on Thursday that some European Union (EU) member states were treating Ukraine as a second-class country.
“The strategic uncertainty over Ukraine’s European perspective in recent years by some EU capitals has failed and must end,” Kuleba said on Twitter, adding that it had only encouraged Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Kuleba condemned the “second-class attitude” towards Ukraine, which hurts Ukrainians.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Thursday that Ukraine would not be able to join the EU expeditiously.
“There are no shortcuts to the EU,” Scholz said, adding that granting Ukraine an exemption would not be fair to the countries of the Western Balkans, which also want to join the bloc. “The accession process is not a matter of a few months or years,” he stressed.
At the same time, Scholz called for other ways to help Ukraine in the short term, with a focus on “rapid and pragmatic support”.
French President Emmanuel Macron has also announced that it will take decades for a country like Ukraine to join the EU.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called this position unfair.
“It’s like a table with the whole family sitting together, you’re invited but not given a chair,” Zelensky said in a speech to French students.
He hoped that Ukraine would be granted EU candidate status as early as June.
It has already been reported that in April the President of Ukraine submitted to the Head of the EU Delegation in Ukraine a completed first part of the EU questionnaire, which serves as a basis for accession negotiations. This questionnaire, the completion of which is a necessary step in order for Ukraine to be granted the status of an EU candidate country, was presented to Zelenski by the President of the European Commission (EC) Urzula von der Leiena on April 8 in Kiev.
The decision to grant candidate status will be taken by EU Member States on the basis of an EC recommendation, and the EC will monitor the complex and potentially lengthy process.
In order for Ukraine to join the EU, it will have to meet high standards of public administration, the rule of law and show progress in the fight against corruption.
Moldova and Georgia have also applied to join the EU following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
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