President of Estonia: Ukraine should start preparing for EU membership now
Estonian President, Kersti Kaljulaid, believes that Ukraine should prepare for negotiations on their membership in the European Union even before the potential is recognized, as Kaljulaid stated in Brussels on the eve of the Eastern Partnership summit.
In answering journalists’ questions about when the EU will recognize the prospect of Eastern partners' membership, the President noted that they should not wait for formal recognition, but start to work now on preparing for the membership negotiations.
"When this moment comes, you should be in a situation where you can open the first chapters of negotiations on the rule of law and human rights on Monday morning and conclude these negotiations on Friday evening," she noted.
The Estonian leader has noted that this approach applies to all three associated partners of the EU - Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia.
The European Commissioner for European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations, Johannes Hahn, indicated that it is unrealistic to talk about Ukraine's membership in the European Union in the coming years.