Lack of progress on joining EU caps another bad month for Ukraine

Ukraine is having a tougher-than-usual time in the intervening time. On the frontlines, the battle of Pokrovsk is raging, and it doesn’t appear to be Ukraine is successful it.

Nor do issues look good for the nation’s vitality resilience after months of an intensive Russian air marketing campaign concentrating on key infrastructure. In keeping with the UN, this might set off one other main humanitarian disaster within the already war-ravaged nation.

The geopolitical image appears to be like equally grim. The supply of long-range Tomahawk missiles, sought by Kyiv for months now, has once more been dominated out by the US president, Donald Trump. What’s extra, after his assembly with the Chinese language president, Xi Jinping, in South Korea on October 30, Trump mentioned that the US and China would work collectively to finish the conflict in Ukraine.

The opportunity of a productive collaboration between Trump and Xi on peace in Ukraine, not to mention its profitable conclusion, is distant. And even when there was a Washington-Beijing sponsored deal, it will not be in Ukraine’s favour as grew to become clear a number of days later.

Throughout a high-profile, two-day go to of the Russian prime minister, Mikhail Mishustin, to China on November 3 and 4, Beijing confirmed no indicators of backing out of its partnership with Russia, which is essential to sustaining the Kremlin’s conflict machine.

Nor does the persevering with delay in approving an EU mortgage to Ukraine price €60 billion (£53 billion) and backed by frozen Russian property bode nicely for Kyiv.

Given all this unhealthy information, it was due to this fact no shock that Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, leapt at what regarded, on the floor, like excellent news within the European fee’s newest evaluation of Kyiv’s progress in direction of EU membership. The European fee notes in its report that Ukraine has made progress in the entire 33 totally different chapters of the accession negotiations. That is as outstanding as it’s commendable provided that the nation has carried out so within the shadow of Russia’s aggression since February 2022.

But, in lots of areas, progress is modest at greatest. A extra cautious evaluation of the 2025 fee report means that optimistic information, if any, is within the presentation, not the underlying information.

For instance, in relation to the battle towards corruption the fee studies that latest developments “solid doubts on Ukraine’s dedication to its anti-corruption agenda”. That is primarily a reference to makes an attempt by Zelensky’s authorities to restrict the independence of the nation’s anti-corruption establishments. The problem triggered large public protests in the summertime and compelled a partial authorities climb-down.

Worryingly, the fee additionally notes “political strain on anti-corruption activists” and “harassment and intimidation of journalists”. This consists of “circumstances of strategic lawsuits towards public participation (SLAPPs) associated to journalistic investigations”.

In the meantime, within the battle towards critical and organised crime, the fee report states: “The freezing and confiscation of felony property stay very restricted.” Different shortcomings concern restricted progress on decentralisation, lack of transparency in recruitment to civil service positions, the independence and impartiality of the judiciary, and the persistence of torture and unwell remedy within the jail and detention system.

On the one hand, it isn’t stunning that these shortcomings exist. Ukraine has been preventing an existential conflict for nearly 4 years. The nation has solely been a candidate nation for EU membership since June 2022, 4 months after Russia launched its full-scale invasion. Accession negotiations didn’t begin till December 2023.

But it’s the persistence of those extremely seen, simply exploitable issues associated to elementary values of the EU which might be inflicting concern. Virtually equivalent points had been raised within the European fee’s opinion on Ukraine’s membership software in 2022. It was raised once more within the 2023 report and once more in final yr’s progress report on accession negotiations.

It could be an exaggeration to assert that Ukraine is experiencing a flip in direction of a extra autocratic fashion of presidential authorities beneath Zelensky. However there clearly are indicators that war-time politics in Kyiv has a darker aspect that does little to bolster the nation’s credentials for EU membership.

Discord inside

This offers simple ammunition for Ukraine’s detractors contained in the EU. Chief amongst them is Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, whose obstruction ways have annoyed European fee efforts on Ukraine’s accession.

Poland and Slovakia have joined Hungary in defying the EU’s effforts to finish an up to date commerce take care of Ukraine. Opposition to Ukraine from inside the EU has now been additional strengthened by the formation of a eurosceptic, hard-right populist authorities coalition within the Czech republic.

The EU’s international affairs chief, Kaja Kallas, continues to insist that membership for Ukraine by 2030 “is a practical purpose”.

However the EU’s enlargement commissioner, Marta Kos, is extra guarded. She has famous that “future accession treaties might want to include stronger safeguards” to “reassure our residents within the Member States that the integrity of our Union and democratic values are ensured, additionally after the accession”.

In an interview with the Monetary Occasions, she mentioned that she didn’t “wish to go down because the commissioner bringing within the Trojan horses”.

Given the element in Ukraine’s 2025 progress report on areas the place Kyiv clearly must make pressing enhancements, this implies that the powerful occasions for Ukraine are prone to proceed, and never simply in its conflict with Russia.

Although the way forward for the EU and Ukraine have develop into ever extra intently entwined since February 2022, there stays an even bigger query for the EU. Its dilemma is learn how to stability holding the road on its membership requirements and enabling Ukraine to carry the road towards Russia.