Brussels, 08/04/2010 (Agence Europe) - Hugues Mingarelli, Deputy Director General at the European Commission's DG External Relations, is positive that there will be a conclusion to the association agreement negotiations between the European Union and Ukraine. On Wednesday 7 April, Mingarelli addressed the external affairs parliamentary committee and indicated that these negotiations would continue at the same pace and were expected to finish in six to twelve months time. He did not, however, give any precise date in this connection. Mingarelli pointed out that during the new Ukrainian president's trip to Brussels on 1 March, Viktor Yanukovych had made a number of “encouraging comments regarding the pro-European direction of his country” and had said everything they had expected from him.
According to Mingarelli, a few weeks will be needed to conclude the following chapters in the association agreement: policy, sectoral cooperation, and freedom, security and justice. Mingarelli said that the point requiring most time is territorial integrity: “Our Ukrainian friends have to understand that the European Union cannot ensure the security of its external partners”.
Negotiations for this association agreement began in March 2007 but have speeded up since Ukraine joined the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in May 2008, which allows the prospect of an agreement for a complete and far-reaching free trade zone between the EU and Ukraine.
Nonetheless, despite this progress, Mingarelli recognised that two events could block the conclusion of negotiations. Ukraine would be under pressure to join the Customs Union with Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, which would make a free trade zone with the EU a more remote prospect. Conditions developed by Russia for new negotiations on gas prices could hinder the conclusion of EU/Ukraine negotiations.
Parliamentarians still have reservations about the date of the conclusion of these negotiations. Pawe³ Kowal (ECR, Poland), the president of the EU/Ukraine delegation at the European Parliament pointed out that “during the Swedish Presidency (Ed: July-December 2009), they already said that negotiations would finish in six months”. Nonetheless, with the Ukrainian presidential campaign, these negotiations slowed down in the second half of 2009. (C-C.G.transl.fl)