The European Commission supports the opening of negotiations on Ukraineʼs accession to the EU

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she supports the opening of the first cluster in negotiations on Ukraineʼs accession to the European Union.

She wrote about this in H.

"Under continuous fire, Ukraine is implementing reform after reform. That is why the Commission is advocating the opening of the first block of negotiations. Ukraine has done it — now we must too. Because the accession process is based on merit. And Ukraine deserves to move forward," the message says.

This statement was made after the EU summit failed to adopt a statement in support of Ukraine.

At the summit, EU states highly praised the pace of reforms related to the accession process and welcomed the "significant progress". The countries agreed to take note of the European Commissionʼs assessment that Ukraine is ready to open the "Fundamentals of the EU Accession Process" cluster. However, the formal opening of negotiations under the cluster requires unanimous consent from all 27 EU members, which is currently lacking. Therefore, the European Council plans to return to discussing this issue at the next summit.

• Ukraine applied for membership in the European Union on February 28, 2022, four days after the start of the full-scale Russian invasion. In June 2022, Ukraine officially became a candidate for membership of the European Union, and within a year, Ukraine and the EU officially began membership negotiations.
• Ukraine and Moldova will jointly open the first negotiating cluster for EU accession. Previously, Brussels considered the option of separating Moldova from Ukraine in the accession process. All because Hungary is blocking Kyivʼs efforts to join.
• For example, in April 2025, the government of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán called on Hungarians to vote against Ukraineʼs membership in the EU in a national poll. The results of this vote were released on June 26 — Hungarian authorities claim that 95% of Hungarians are against Ukraineʼs accession to the EU.

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