Together with the decision to open Cluster 2, "Internal Market", the EU published its Common Position: what the 27 Member States expect from Ukraine in nine negotiating chapters and on what conditions each can be closed. If Cluster 1 is about how the state is organised, Cluster 2 is about how the economy is organised. I go through the nine chapters, one interesting detail from each, and the four things that matter most.
EPIK has published my commentary on the European Commission's package "Preparing for a wider Union". It is the EU's first systemic answer to the question of its own readiness for enlargement: solid, but unfinished in places. One issue is conspicuous by its absence: reconstruction.
On 6 October the European Commission presents its Communication on preparing the EU for enlargement. The draft leaked by POLITICO shows accession turning into a cascade of gradual-integration decisions, with safeguards running for years after entry. What the document gets right, and four things that would make it stronger.
Will the European Commission's new roadmaps pave a clear path to the EU for Ukraine, or will they repeat the prolonged Western Balkan scenario? This note outlines four critical conditions needed to protect the integration process from political vetoes and deliver tangible economic benefits well before official membership.
The European legislation that the Verkhovna Rada will later transpose almost word for word is written without Ukraine in the room. In the first text of the EPIK series on institutional integration, I propose four steps in the European Parliament that can be taken now, without changing the EU treaties. The price: 361 votes.
The communication following the call between Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Ursula von der Leyen says nothing about opening negotiating clusters or about progress on accession. The "industrial visa-free regime" is not mentioned either. There is only a passage on the reforms the Verkhovna Rada has to adopt, and in the language of diplomacy it says a great deal.
In Ursula von der Leyen's State of the Union address, the most concrete commitments to Ukraine came in the security section, while enlargement received one sentence. Ukraine may end up integrating through defence faster than through the market. The roadmaps for candidates have not yet been written, so now is the time to push for steps from the EU side, above all on market access.
On 29 August, 52.8% of Icelanders said "no" to returning to negotiations on EU membership. I draw three conclusions: the EEA/EFTA model works, the next enlargement has lost a convenient political construction, and the EU's appeal for wealthy states has limits. Ukraine and the other candidates have to think even harder about how to sell enlargement inside the EU itself.
On 14 July, Ukraine opened the sixth negotiating cluster with the EU, "External Relations". It is the smallest cluster by number of chapters and one of the most strategic: Ukraine's trade policy will become part of the EU's common policy, while in foreign policy alignment already stands at 95%. Here is what the EU Common Position requires to close Chapters 30 and 31, and where Ukraine is already prepared.
The opening of Cluster 1, "Fundamentals", came with the EU Common Position, which sets the main requirements and benchmarks for Ukraine in the most important cluster of the accession negotiations. I go through the essentials: democratic institutions, public administration, Chapters 23 and 24, economic criteria, procurement, statistics and financial control. The main test is no longer whether Ukraine can pass laws, but whether its institutions can deliver results.