Ukraine insists on no territorial restrictions in EU accession agreement

Kyiv's fundamental stance is that the future agreement on Ukraine's accession to the EU must not contain any restrictions on territorial application.

Source: European Pravda; Ukrinform news agency, citing Olha Stefanishyna, Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration, during an hour of questions to the government in the Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian parliament)

Details: Stefanishyna noted that the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement did not contain any territorial restrictions, although parts of Ukrainian territories were already occupied by Russia.

"As for the war and EU membership, this is my fundamental position based on legal arguments related to the process of signing the Association Agreement. It was signed when Crimea was annexed and hostilities began in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.

However, the Association Agreement does not contain a single word related to its territorial application, and Ukraine's membership agreement must not contain such restrictions," she said.

Stefanishyna added that a special procedure of the European Commission provides for a recommendation to operate in a country where part of the territory is not under effective control, such as in the case of Cyprus.

The official stressed that the state will proceed from the premise that there can be no restrictions on the territorial application of the agreement in its negotiating framework, which it will present at the first intergovernmental conference in June.

"European integration will run from Sevastopol to Kyiv," the official said.

Background: 

• Ukraine and Brussels are working to ensure that the official commencement of negotiations on Ukraine's accession to the EU takes place no later than the end of June, when Belgium's presidency of the EU Council ends and Hungary's six-month presidency begins.
• Earlier, Katarina Mathernova, EU Ambassador to Ukraine, said that Ukraine was ready to start negotiations on accession to the EU and hoped for their start in late June.

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