During an unprecedented session of the European Parliament’s (EP) Foreign Affairs Committee in Brussels, ministers from several EU countries met with MEPs to discuss enlargement, which was already one of the political-economic bloc’s main issues, but has gained new relevance since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Today’s institutions must show leadership capacity, enlargement has never been as important as it is today,” said Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis.
The official warned that if the European Union does not take advantage of the opportunity to integrate countries like Ukraine, “there are those who will take advantage of this to harm” the community bloc, alluding to Moscow.
“It is a very important geopolitical move, it is the greatest guarantee of Ukraine’s security and growth in the long term, therefore, I call for negotiations to begin in June at the latest”, he added, criticizing “Hungary’s blackmail” in recent months.
“I ask Budapest not to have myopia,” he added.
Lithuania is one of the bloc countries that has most called for Ukraine’s integration, insisting that it must be completed by 2030.
Other countries, such as Portugal, have a more cautious stance, not wanting to frustrate candidates’ expectations, but warn that including more countries is only possible with a structural reform of European institutions.
In line with his Lithuanian counterpart, Latvian Foreign Minister Krisjanis Karins dramatized “a dichotomy” in the current geopolitical context.
“Either we all belong to the European Union or we are influenced, perhaps through an invasion, by Russia”, he said.
Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna considered that Russian President Vladimir Putin “is the biggest sponsor” of the EU and the Atlantic Alliance, alluding to the accession of Finland and Sweden to the political-military bloc following the invasion of Ukraine, and the requests for EU membership and progress in this direction from several countries that previously had no European aspirations.
And before MEPs and his counterparts he left a warning: “The time for gray areas is over, we must move forward and create Europe’s new security architecture. The gray areas [posições ambíguas e neutralidade] are a green light for aggression by Putin.”
More than two years after the Russian invasion, which occupied large portions of Ukraine’s territory (it had already occupied Crimea in 2014), Ukraine applied for membership of the EU and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
In December 2023, the European Commission considered that the Ukrainian authorities had done enough to reform the country and bring it into line, as far as possible to date, with European standards, therefore recommending the opening of formal accession negotiations.
NATO, for its part, has recognized for several months that Ukraine will be part of the political-military bloc and as a sign of this, it has even created the NATO-Ukraine Council, but full membership, as a country covered by the article that grants total protection, it will only be possible, at least, with a cessation of the conflict on Ukrainian territory.
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Tags: Eastern flank calls implementation enlargement Ukraine
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