Brussels, 25/09/2014 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 25 September, Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko announced that his country would submit an official request for EU accession in 6 years - in other words in 2020.
On 25 September, Poroshenko is due to present a strategy that provides for 60 special programmes and reforms so that Ukraine might “submit a request for accession to the European Union in six years”, Poroshenko stated at a meeting with judges, according to his press staff.
Prime minister calls for sanctions to be maintained. Elsewhere, from the rostrum of the United Nations on 24 September, Ukraine's Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenuk called on the West, including the EU, not to lift their sanctions on Russia until Ukraine has regained “the entirety of its territory”. “We call on our partners not to lift the sanctions until Ukraine has regained control on the whole of the east of its territory”, he said. In Yatsenyuk's view, imposing sanctions is the way to beginning “real negotiations” and to “forging” peace agreements.
The ambassadors of the EU countries are due to discuss the situation in Ukraine on Tuesday 30 September and Wednesday 1 October, and to conduct “a full examination of the implementation of the peace plan” on the basis of a review carried out by the European External Action Service (EEAS), as announced by European Council President Herman Van Rompuy on 11 September. Van Rompuy had underlined that “in the light of the review and if the situation on the ground so warrants, the Commission and EEAS are invited to put forward proposals to amend, suspend or repeal the set of sanctions in force, in all or in part” (see EUROPE 11153).
In Kiev, Poroshenko stated that no victim had been reported in the east of the country over the last 24 hours - a sign that the truce “is finally starting to work”, in his opinion. He also underlined that “the main and most dangerous part of the war is already over”. Poroshenko has ordered the Ukrainian government to prepare for the possible temporary closure of the 2,300 km border that Ukraine shares with Russia. (CG)