The relationship between Ukraine and the EU may be accurately and succinctly described in one phrase: they both agree the other is important, but they don’t understand or trust one another. The story of relations between Brussels and Kyiv is thus one of unrequited love.
The EU has been making efforts to approach Ukraine ever since the latter became independent. During the 1990s, the two parties entered into a Partnership and Cooperation agreement, which however, as both parties agree, has failed to live up to expectations. Admittedly, Ukraine had acknowledged the EU and its values under both President Kravchuk and Kuchma, but actual steps towards the EU have not been taken. In actual fact, the concept of a multi-vector policy was being pursued; however, this did not mean that they were on good terms with all their neighbouring countries and associations that were interlinking them. On the contrary, they were keeping everyone quiet on all sides with non-binding declarations of good intentions.
The EU–Ukraine relations acquired a new impetus with the Orange Revolution and the assumption of the presidency by Viktor Yushchenko. He declared that rapprochement with the European Union would be the very first foreign policy priority of his country. The honesty of this approach was unintentionally underpinned by the fact that relations with Russia, which saw itself deprived of benefits after attempts to rig the voting in this election failed, rapidly deteriorated.
The European Parliament hailed the Orange Revolution with glee, and its decision dating from January 2005 compelled the European Commission as well as the Council to show greater willingness to cooperate with Ukraine in the ENP proposal. In addition to the Action Plan, which had been negotiated with the previous government within the ENP framework, there was a ten-point declaration compiled by the two figures responsible for EU foreign or external policy, the High Representative Javier Solana and the EU Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner. However, the nature of the European Neighborhood Policy remained unchanged as a result. In other words, the Neighborhood Policy has not shifted from its objective of bringing about closer ties with partner countries, without promising them EU membership.
On the other hand, this has directly led to embitterment in Ukraine and has not contributed to enthusiastic implementation of the reform program, which had already been outlined. This was what disappointed Brussels. “We are continually conducting some negotiations or other with Ukraine, we are putting masses of money in, and absolutely nothing is happening in Kiev” — such phrases can be heard in the corridors of the Commission and the Council.
In addition, there is an all-out party faction strike, which has been deployed by the political elite in Ukraine and which has been crippling the country for some considerable time. A country that is aspiring to become an EU and NATO member, but for months on end fails to appoint anyone to the posts of the foreign minister or defence minister and in which parliamentary debate consists of one party blocking the microphone in the Session Hall thus preventing the other side from speaking at all, does not comply with the expectations that the European Union sets for its partners.
Disappointment is in particular predominant, because the EU sees Ukraine as its most important partner in the East. This point has been stressed over and over in the last number of years in documents issued by the Council and the European Commission. The EU would like to make its relations with Ukraine into a model for any relations with third countries. The desired central element is an Association Agreement, which, in the framework of the Eastern Partnership – intensification of the European Neighborhood Policy toward the East as agreed in 2009 – is aimed at extensive interlinking between Ukraine and the EU. A free trade zone is one component in these deliberations, and in the longer term the thorny visa question is to be tackled. It must be said that this offer has not met with much enthusiasm in Kiev.
Both sides are suspicious of one another: Ukraine does not trust the possibility that as a result of the Neighborhood Policy and the Eastern Partnership there might still be EU membership for Ukraine, and the EU does not believe that readiness and capacity exist in Ukrainian politics to shoulder the reform efforts that were agreed to on paper. As things look at the moment, both sides are right. To be sure, by this time, both within the EU and with external partners, everyone has settled on the formulation that the Eastern Partnership is being put into place as something completely divorced from possible EU membership, but all those involved see clearly that the Eastern Partnership is an alternative to becoming an EU member state. However, the statement is not true in the converse: being an EU member state is, in fact, not an alternative to the Eastern Partnership. Ukraine has thus nothing to gain by being tentative, because an alternative to the Eastern Partnership is standard Third Country relations, such as those the EU has with Chile or Nigeria.
There is no benefit for Ukraine to be gained, even by turning away from the European Union. Admittedly, Russia is holding out temptations such as gas, oil, free trade, and the Eurasian Economic Community, but an alliance that might make independent modern development possible looks something different. Moscow and Brussels are not simply two unlike foci of integration that, as if they were two different makes of car, differ only in the color and trim details. Russia creates cohesion by means of pressure, Ukraine had the opportunity to feel this several times in the last few years. And even Alexander Lukashenko, who is neither a radical reformer nor a critical democrat, was forced to realize, on several occasions in the recent past, that all the free trade agreements are worth nothing if the Kremlin is annoyed. Trying to manage a course involving independent modernization in conjunction with a partner like this is a roller-coaster ride. There are violent movements up or down, and in the end you arrive back at the point where you set out.
In contrast, the European Union stakes on positive incentives. It tries to support its partners in moving along their independent path of political, economic, and social reforms and to encourage particularly those countries that are taking on the tasks and are thus producing results. At the root of this is a concept of integration that is different from the one pursued by the Russian leadership.
European integration is voluntary and seeks solutions not by means of force, but through compromise and cooperation. This method has served the EU member states well over the past five decades in no small way. The EU does not retain its partners in its own camp by means of force, but through the provision of cooperation.
How seriously the EU takes its proposals can however only be found out in Kyiv if they too finally start to get down to things. Reforms in Ukraine are not needed in order to please the EU, but in order to bring along this admirable country with its sizeable potential. The EU is both able and willing to be a partner in the venture.
How mutual relations will develop in the long term and whether this might one day lead to Ukraine becoming a member state of the European Union cannot at present be foreseen. At this moment in time and in the immediate future, Ukraine’s accession is not on the agenda. It is not suited to accede, nor is the EU is in a position to accept the new member.
Both sides would therefore do well not to waste any more time and energy on this discussion of a chimera, but get down to the tasks at hand. If in the next several years we do manage to set up the common trade, services, and labor mobility spaces, which have been made possible by the Association Agreement, then we will have achieved a great deal – and very many people will have a better life.
Prof. Dr. Eckart D. Stratenschulte, Director of the European Academy Berlin
