Infrastructure Minister: Brexit May Delay Open Skies Agreement between Ukraine and the EU

Infrastructure Minister Volodymyr Omelyan believes that Brexit may harm the Open Skies agreement between Ukraine and the EU, as he told Ukrayinska Pravda. "The referendum has no direct effect – the respective decision of the Parliament is needed. The EU has to exclude the UK from all its treaties and notify the third-party countries," he noted.

"We discussed Open Skies with the European Commission yesterday. Unfortunately, negative outcomes of the referendum will jeopardize our situation. But we won’t give up," Minister highlighted.

He also noted that if the UK leaves the European Union, the Gibraltar issue will no longer be a problem for the agreement. Gibraltar is a contested territory between Spain and the UK, and unless this dispute is resolved, the agreement cannot be signed. "But this is a matter of perspective, while Ukraine needs agreement rather than perspective."

"I prioritize the Open Skies at all talks with the European Commission and EU member states", Omelyan added. Apart from the Gibraltar-related provisions, the parties put their initials on the Open Skies agreements in 2013.

Source: Ukrayinska Pravda, Roman Romaniuk, Olena Roshchenko