No easy route to European Union membership for Ukraine

Serious discussion is under way about Ukraine’s possible accession to the European Union. The fact that such a possibility is being considered is remarkable, given that Russian president Vladimir Putin’s primary war aim was to overturn Ukraine’s independence, democracy and western orientation.

It is hard to know what exactly is going on in the stuttering negotiations to bring Russia’s grotesque invasion to an end. However, plausible reports suggest that if Ukraine were to agree not to join Nato, Russia would no longer seek to block its accession to the EU.

It is not surprising that Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy wants his country to accede to a European Union that has consolidated democracy across Europe, including in many central and eastern European countries that had long suffered under Soviet domination. British prime minister Boris Johnson’s comparison of the UK’s decision to leave the EU to Ukraine’s courageous struggle for freedom was recognised, including in the United Kingdom, as contemptible.

Zelenskiy understands what freedom is. And it looks a hell of a lot more like membership of the European Union than the self-isolation of Brexit.

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The prospect of possible Ukrainian accession raises four profound challenges for the EU.

How can the EU allow more countries to join and at the same time remain worth joining?

First, there is the question of how the bloc can continue to enlarge while preserving its essential nature and decision-making capacity. To put it another way, how can the EU allow more countries to join and at the same time remain worth joining? It has already shown remarkable creativity and adaptability in growing from six member states to 27, a process that has enriched the European Union but also placed it under strain.

Second, prospective membership of Ukraine cannot be dealt with in isolation. Five other countries are already formal candidates for membership and two more have been recognised by the EU as potential candidates. In other words, even if some of those applicants are a long way from membership, accession negotiations with Ukraine would have to take account of the wider enlargement process.

Third, there are complex economic, political and legal issues that have to be addressed when considering the accession of any new state. Those issues will be all the greater in Ukraine’s case, given its size and geography. Ukraine would be the most populous country to join the EU since Spain in 1986. Developments in Poland and Hungary serve as a reminder that respect for the rule of law is one key issue that will have to be addressed comprehensively and convincingly in the case of any new member state.

Fourth, there are challenges arising from Putin’s ongoing threat to Ukraine. If Russia has indeed moved recently to accepting, for now, Ukraine’s right to exist as an independent country, that is not because it has suddenly seen the light but because it has seen the colour of Ukrainian patriotism, as well as the impact of international sanctions.

It seems very likely that Russia will continue to try to undermine Ukrainian democracy, all the more so if Ukraine joins the EU. Putin would like nothing more than a pro-Russian puppet government in Kyiv along the lines of President Lukashenko in Belarus. While it is difficult today to imagine how Putin could achieve by destabilisation what he could not achieve by military invasion, the EU must avoid even the smallest possibility of a totalitarian Trojan Horse emerging within its walls. The Hungarian government’s cosying up to Putin, as well as the pro-Putin sentiment in Serbia, the EU candidacy of which will presumably now be frozen, serve as stark warning signs.

None of this is to suggest that the European Union should reject Ukraine as a candidate. On the contrary, the bloc should decisively embrace Ukraine’s European aspirations.

The EU will rise again to the challenge of shaping the peace and stability of our continent

The EU has twice before had the courage to embrace truly historic change – namely when it was founded in the aftermath of the second World War, and when it responded imaginatively to the emergence of new European democracies after the collapse of the Soviet Union. I am confident the EU will rise again to the challenge of shaping the peace and stability of our continent.

However, the profound challenges posed by Ukraine’s legitimate and welcome desire to join the EU must be recognised.

Importantly, any negotiations about EU membership must be exclusively between Ukraine and the member states of the European Union. There can be no role whatever in such negotiations for Nato, the United States, Turkey, or any other country that may take on providing security guarantees for Ukraine, an important but entirely different issue.

In particular, any British commentators who will be tempted to criticise the EU for grappling, as it will have to, with the complexities of Ukrainian accession, would do better – if they wish to combat Putin’s ambitions – to press for reconsideration of the UK’s own EU membership.