After joining NATO was hopeless, Ukrainian President Zelenskiy, who was in the whirlpool of the Russian-Ukrainian crisis, started the idea of the European Union again. According to Agence France-Presse, on February 28, local time, before Russia and Ukraine held negotiations in Belarus, Zelenskiy called on the EU to immediately grant Ukraine membership and signed a document for Ukraine to join the EU.
Two days ago, Zelenskiy also called out to the European Union through social media, asking it to make a decision on Ukraine's accession. It is reported that since Zelenskiy became the president of Ukraine, he has been seeking the status of a member of the European Union. Previously, Ukraine signed a contact country agreement with the EU, but as of now, Ukraine has not even obtained the qualification of EU candidacy.
According to the relevant procedures for joining the EU, a country must first be listed as a candidate member state, and then accept the EU's long-term observation to assess whether it meets the criteria for accession, and when the time is ripe, it can become a full member of the EU after the vote of all member states. For Zelenskiy's request, European Commission President von der Leyen's response lit up.
She said that she is in favor of Ukraine's accession to the European Union, the two sides have maintained close cooperation in many areas, and Ukraine will certainly become a member of the European Union in the future, and the EU hopes to accept Ukraine. However, von der Leyen then took a sharp turn, saying that Ukraine's most important job now is to negotiate with Russia and end the military conflict between the two countries at an early date.
That is to say, her support for Kiev's entry is preconditioned, and Zelenskiy must first solve the mess in front of him, which is actually to draw a big pie. Another senior EU official, The High Representative for Foreign Affairs Borrell, said that whether to accept Ukraine's accession to the EU is not on the current agenda, and the EU will provide support mainly in the form of military assistance.
In addition, Borrelli said that at present, Ukraine has not formally submitted an application to join the European Union, so it will not start special procedures to allow Ukraine to join the European Union. The main reason why Zelenskiy asked the EU to accept Ukraine as soon as possible was to borrow the EU's light, that is, after joining the EU, he could let the latter come forward to help fight Against Russia.
However, from the actual situation, Zelenskiy's ideas are not mature. The original intention of the establishment of the EU is to promote European integration and promote trade exchanges and economic development of European countries, so the EU is essentially an economic organization. Although many EU member states are NATO members and the two organizations are closely linked, there are many differences between the two.
There is no alternative between the EU's focus on the economy and NATO's focus on security and defense. If Ukraine wants to gain a sense of security by joining an organization, the best option is NATO, not the EU. It is also worth noting that the leaders of the European Union and NATO are different, the former is led by France and Germany, while the latter is led by the United States.
The leaders of the two organizations are different, resulting in their different positions on Russia. Although the EU also has an anti-Russian side, it is more to find a state of peace with Russia. In the eyes of the EU, it has many common interests with Moscow, especially in the context of the latter's control of the EU's energy lifeblood, and the EU does not want to completely "tear its face".
Therefore, before the Russian-Ukrainian crisis escalated into war, France and Germany, the two major EU member states, had been mediating between Russia and Ukraine, hoping that the situation would cool down and solve the problem through dialogue. Even after the outbreak of the Russo-Ukrainian war, the EU had obvious differences with the US-led NATO on sanctions against Russia.
For example, France and Germany have asked the United States to carefully consider the serious consequences of removing Russia from the SWIFT international settlement system, and although Europe eventually followed the United States in imposing sanctions on Russia, it was clearly reluctant. In contrast, NATO's anti-Russian stance is more pure.
Nato, founded during the Cold War, was originally intended to be a military confrontation, and before it focused on dealing with the Soviet Union, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the target turned to Russia. Up to now, NATO has implemented five rounds of eastward expansion, and Russia's former partners have become sworn enemies in the process of NATO's eastward expansion. The EU is not only different from NATO in nature, but there are still many contradictions between the two sides, and even secretly compete.
In recent years, the EU has been advocating for defense autonomy, thereby shedding its dependence on NATO on national security. France wants the EU to form a European army to deal with urgent matters. However, defense, as the pillar of NATO, once it is shaken by the EU, NATO will exist in name only, so NATO led by the United States opposes the EU's defense autonomy plan.
From this point of view, even if Ukraine joins the EU, it will not be able to guarantee security, and the EU will not replace NATO. In addition, Ukraine wants to enter the Eu, but in fact, it also faces considerable difficulties. A few days ago, EU officials revealed that when discussing Ukraine's accession to the Eu, "infighting" occurred in the 27 member states of the EU, and not all member states agreed, so the prospects of Ukraine's accession to the EU were not optimistic.