Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy asked the European Union (EU) on Monday to allow Ukraine to gain “immediate” membership under a simplified procedure.
“We ask the European Union for Ukraine’s immediate accession via a new special procedure,” Zelenskyy said remarks on his Telegram channel, Politico reported.
“Our goal is to be together with all Europeans and most importantly, to be on an equal footing,” he added. “I’m sure it’s fair. I’m sure it’s possible.”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in an interview with Euronews on Sunday that “they [Ukraine] are one of us and we want them in.”
“We have very close cooperation on the energy grid, for example. So many topics where we work very closely together and indeed over time, they belong to us,” she added.
When pressed about the possibility of peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, von der Leyen said that it’s important Ukraine agrees to peace talks but said that trust in Russian President Vladimir Putin is nonexistent.
“Of course, it is important that the Ukrainian side agrees to the peace talks and that conditions are fine for the Ukrainian side. In general, it is always better to have peace talks than to have a fight. But, the trust in President Putin is completely broken and eroded,” she said in the interview.
Politico noted that it is not clear what a simplified procedure would look like to fast-track Ukraine’s immediate membership to the EU.
“The decision to add new countries to the EU lies with established member countries, which don’t always agree with the Commission’s views,” the report said.
Late last week, reports broke that the EU would freeze Putin and his foriegn minister Sergey Lavrov’s European assets.
"They are responsible for the fact that innocent people die in Ukraine, they are responsible for the fact that the international system is trampled upon and we as Europeans do not accept that,” German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock told reporters last week.