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EU member states have warned Brussels against giving Ukraine an unrealistic expectation of rapidly joining the bloc, ahead of a summit in Kyiv where Volodymyr Zelenskyy is pressing for progress on accession and reconstruction. Zelenskyy is due to host his EU counterparts Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel this week, where he is expected to lobby for the country’s EU membership, the use of frozen Russian assets to fund Ukraine’s reconstruction and a legal mechanism to prosecute Russians for war crimes. Senior diplomats from EU capitals are concerned that unfeasible Ukrainian expectations — including EU accession by 2026 — have been encouraged rather than tempered by Brussels’ top officials.
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https://www.ft.com/content/3275f83f-e765-4709-a5da-ec9b02fea237
No political leader wants to be on the wrong side of history . . . Nobody wants to be blamed for not doing enough,” said one senior EU diplomat. “So they tell them it’s all possible.” In response to Russia’s invasion last February, the EU scrambled to support Ukraine through military, humanitarian and financial packages, including sanctions against Russia that have hit the bloc’s own economies. The EU also took the unprecedented step of making Ukraine an official membership candidate, despite it falling short of the standard requirements. But while some central and eastern European member states have championed Ukraine’s demands, other northern and western capitals worry about how its large, poor population and vast agricultural sector could be integrated with the EU. France’s president Emmanuel Macron has been notably cautious about the speed of Ukraine’s accession, warning in May, before the country was formally made a candidate, that the process could take “several decades”. The EU’s leadership has struck an optimistic tone. European Commission president von der Leyen said on a visit to Kyiv in September that the “accession process is well on track”. “It’s impressive to see the speed, the determination, the preciseness with which you are progressing,” she added.