By Sarah Collins - 10th July 2008
External relations chief Benita Ferrero-Waldner has said she hopes to put the question of a new EU-Ukraine agreement on the table at the next council meeting in October.
She admitted that talks on a new pact, now in their ninth round, have failed to clarify exactly what kind of form it will take.
“Negotiations with Ukraine have been going well,” she said on Friday at an event organised by the European Policy Centre, a Brussels-based think-tank.
“The big question now is what will be the title [of the agreement]. I hope that by the next council meeting we will have the question on the table. We have not yet decided.
“There are different voices at the table.”
Relations between the two sides are currently governed by an action plan under the EU’s neighbourhood policy (ENP), but Ukraine wants to scrap that in favour of a pact that includes a “membership perspective”.
However, a membership perspective is only possible under the EU’s enlargement strategy – something the commission keeps very separate from the ENP.
And while not entirely ruling Ukraine out of the running for EU membership, Ferrero-Waldner remains adamant that such a pact is not possible in the near future.
“It’s clear – although Ukraine never likes to hear it – that it is a country within the European neighbourhood policy. It does not have a membership perspective, but we should not prejudge the future,” she said.
The new plan, termed a “new enhanced agreement” by the two sides, will include a deep and comprehensive free trade area, as long as Ukraine comes into line on certain economic and sectoral chapters already agreed.
Last week deputy prime minister Hryhoriy Nemyria told TheParliament.com that his country had already provisionally closed two chapters. However, negotiations on the free trade area look set to take more time.
The EU and Ukraine will discuss the issue at a summit in Evian in September under the French presidency of the EU.
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