Quite a strange situation has developed around the publication of Ukraine’s Progress Report on the Visa Liberalization Action Plan (VLAP). It was expected that the document would be published by the European Commission (EC) on December 15. However, the day before, the media, citing sources in the EC, said that Ukraine’s efforts would be evaluated later, which probably means December 21, when a meeting of EU nations’ ambassadors to the union is to be held. Meanwhile, December 15 saw EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini stating that “the Commission still finalizes the report and it will be published later this month.”
The Day asked head of the “Europe without Barriers” NGO Iryna Sushko to comment on the delay in publishing of the report.
“The fact that the decision on the visa-free travel has been postponed may be a sign that the Commission believes that certain points in favor of the visa-free travel for Ukrainians are still absent. We have to be honest to ourselves and say frankly that the VLAP has not been completely executed. When the government says that all technical criteria and recommendations have been met, it is wrong to an extent.
“We, independent experts, see that progress on VLAP implementation, especially in recent months, has been noticeable, but there are still certain issues. I would recall the fourth block of the plan here concerning combating discrimination, or the third block concerning anti-corruption measures, or issues like the law-enforcement reform as well as the abolition of immunity of judges and MPs.
“Therefore, in my opinion, the delay of the report is due to the fact that officials of the EC, on the one hand, see that not everything is completed, and on the other, they also realize that this may turn into an unending story.
“And, frankly, we see that the EU itself lacks clear criteria, in particular on the fight against corruption. After all, we know perfectly well that every country has some corruption. Therefore, in the VLAP, everything related to the fight against corruption should have some limits. What is discussed now is where these limits, these criteria are. For example, at first it was clearly stated that Ukraine had to create required anti-corruption agencies, new institutions, but it has turned out that we just need to show progress. And the question is then: what this progress should be, what should it entail?
“When we asked these questions in the EU bodies, they were not always able to clearly answer them. For example, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, and Moldova had political decisions made on granting them the visa-free travel, even though these countries had not met all requirements. It is thus possible that the EC wants to do exactly that at the moment, I mean to enlist the support of the EU Council, the European Parliament, so that after granting Ukraine a positive recommendation on the visa-free travel, in spite of certain shortcomings on the technical side, EU officials will keep pondering over what should serve as the mechanism of influencing the government to continue reforms provided for in the VLAP after the visa-free travel becomes a reality.
“Petro Poroshenko said during a mini-summit with leaders of the EU and the three EU commissioners that Ukraine had demonstrated progress in implementing the VLAP, but meeting technical criteria for the visa liberalization required time-consuming and quality-critical reforms. He went on to say that laws passed by the parliament with great difficulty as part of the visa liberalization package had undergone a broadly-based debate which was the key to the efficiency of the legal framework for both Ukraine and the EU. Furthermore, he added that we should not be obliged to completely agree with all the rules of the EU and adapt to all their standards.
“And secondly, Poroshenko has to promise that the government and the parliament will do everything in order to meet the technical criteria in close communication with colleagues and partners from the EU before the decision of the EU Council and after a positive recommendation from the EC.”
