A number of Ukrainian experts completely agree with the criticism expressed in the report of the European Commission on the implementation of the European Neighborhood Policy in Ukraine for 2011. Coordinator of the Youkraine.eu platform Oleh Rybachuk said at a press conference hosted by Interfax-Ukraine on Thursday, May 17:
According to him, such reports are important evidence about how the European Union estimates the process of reform in Ukraine – they reflect the level and stage of the Ukraine’s integration and also take the temperature of Ukrainian-EU relations, to some extent.
At the same time, the coordinator noted that the assessment of the reforms dealing with democracy is a main criterion for the EU on how sincerely the country, which aspires to gain EU membership, actually desires it. According to him, authorities said that Association Agreement, Free Trade Area were more necessary for the EU, because the Ukrainian market is very attractive to the EU.
“Everything reflected in the report shows contradictory values,” he said adding that such issues as fair and free elections, respect of human rights, freedom of peaceful meetings, mass media freedom, justice independence, fighting corruption are important for the EU.
In turn, Chairman of Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union Arkadiy Buschenko declared:
According to him, in recent years the situation with the human rights has worsened in Ukraine.
He stressed that the country still has a problem with judicial system and also added:
Talking about corruption, an expert from the Ukrainian Institute for Public Policy, Ivan Presniakov said the only successes were on paper.
In the report of the European Commission on the implementation of the European Neighborhood Policy in Ukraine, which was presented on May 15, EU highlighted the slow pace of the implementation of economic reforms, the worsening situation with democracy in Ukraine in 2011, and the absence of significant results in fighting corruption.
Source: https://www.kyivpost.com/news/politics/detail/127765/
