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Ukraine president Volodymr Zelensky meeting EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen. The danger is that accession status to the EU, the so-called 'waiting room of Europe', can lead to unfulfilled expectations — on both sides (Photo: European Commission)

The realists vs idealists Brussels battle on Ukraine's EU accession

The formal granting of any EU accession status is seen as a crucial milestone in Kyiv's path towards Europe. But in reality even the initiation of formal accession negotiations, on which a decision is to be taken soon in Brussels, is anything but straightforward.

And, as the experience of other current candidate countries shows, the accession to this so-called 'waiting room of Europe' can lead to unfulfilled expectations — on both sides.

That, in turn, has often led to twin prob...

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Disclaimer

The views expressed in this opinion piece are the author’s, not those of EUobserver

Author Bio

Dr Michael Martin Richter is the author of Power, Politics, and Anti-Corruption Reforms in Ukraine: The Role of Western Actors and was previously research fellow at the Research Centre for East European Studies at the University of Bremen as well as a fellow at Harvard University and is soon-to-be postdoc research fellow at the University of Surrey within the Horizon 2020 REDEMOS project on EU democracy promotion abroad. His research focuses on democracy promotion in the post-Soviet space and his analyses have been published, among others, in Global Policy, the Journal of Common Market Studies, Politics and Governance, Vox Ukraine, and New Eastern Europe.

Ukraine president Volodymr Zelensky meeting EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen. The danger is that accession status to the EU, the so-called 'waiting room of Europe', can lead to unfulfilled expectations — on both sides (Photo: European Commission)

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Author Bio

Dr Michael Martin Richter is the author of Power, Politics, and Anti-Corruption Reforms in Ukraine: The Role of Western Actors and was previously research fellow at the Research Centre for East European Studies at the University of Bremen as well as a fellow at Harvard University and is soon-to-be postdoc research fellow at the University of Surrey within the Horizon 2020 REDEMOS project on EU democracy promotion abroad. His research focuses on democracy promotion in the post-Soviet space and his analyses have been published, among others, in Global Policy, the Journal of Common Market Studies, Politics and Governance, Vox Ukraine, and New Eastern Europe.

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