The EU-Ukraine Association Agreement: free trade, energy security, and democracy
Euroatlantic Forum “Ukraine and the EU on the brink of a new Association Agreement: free trade, energy security and democracy” took place in Kyiv on January 25-26. It was organized by Polish-Ukrainian Cooperation Foundation PAUCI, The Konrad-Adenauer Stiftung, The Institute for Euro-Atlantic Cooperation, Center for US Ukrainian Relations (CUSUR), Civic Expert Council with support of the International Renaissance Foundation’s European Program, UNITER, USAID, and “Pact”.
Ukrainian and international experts, representatives of NGOs, government institutions and scientists went into the merits of the EU-Ukraine relations at current stage, in particular Ukraine’s readiness to fulfill the commitments in the framework of the Association Agreement (AA) as well as necessary steps which would enable the realization of Ukraine’s inner reforms, foreseen in the agreement.
“The future implementation of the AA is a key challenge after completing the negotiations. For now there is neither understanding no idea how difficult this process will be. The AA is a comprehensive agreement, it covers all aspects of the relations between Ukraine and the EU, it also defines a unique framework for the reforms in all spheres of state. A number of Ukraine’s commitments to fulfill certain requirements already allow us to integrate as deeply as we want to,”- Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Chief of Staff, Pavlo Klimkin believes.
International experts consider the lack of democracy to be not so much important, when signing the AA, as the fact of demonstrating the real intention to pave the way for it. A key concern is to make a way to the EU norms and standards, and the AA itself can open the door to a new Accession Agreement to EU.
In the meantime, Ukrainian experts regard accession to the European Energy Community as Ukraine’s greatest success. “In this area Ukraine is a full-fledged EU member. This success owes much to the process of integration and it should be exemplary for other sectors. We should endeavor best efforts to maintain Ukraine’s membership in the European Energy Community, to block all the attempts that might separate us from the real strategic dialogue on energy around the globe. With this aim in view dialogue should be upgraded from the phase of fear to the one of relations,”- President of Grant Thornton Ukraine, Oleksandr Chalyj explains.
Experts also regard the activities of civil society as a catalyst of European integration. “Ukrainian civic society is a central core to promote the ideas of European integration for today. As far as the public interest towards the document has increased, it is our must to give its adequate and qualified interpretation,” – Oleksandr Sushko is convinced, Research Director at the Institute for Euro-Atlantic Cooperation.
The Association Agreement: A pearl of great value at risk of loss
Photos from the Forum can be found here
Civic Expert Council
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youkraine.eu@gmail.com
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The Goal of the European Program is to promote Ukraine’s European integration by providing financial and expert support to relevant civil society initiatives.
