EU leaders in Brussels will approve the recommendation of the European Commission to grant candidate status to Ukraine and Moldova for accession to the European Union.
This, as "European Pravda" reports, is stated in the latest draft conclusions of the EU summit, with which the publication Euractiv has familiarized itself.
"The European Council has decided to grant candidate country status to Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova," the draft decision of the EU leaders, who will meet at the summit in Brussels on June 23-24, reads.
The EU leaders will decide on further steps for the countries' accession after all the conditions outlined by the European Commission are fully met, the draft decision adds.
The first report on the assessment of Ukraine's compliance with the conditions is expected within the framework of the European Commission's regular analysis on enlargement by the end of this year.
Regarding Georgia, the wording of the EU summit will be: "The European Council is ready to grant Georgia candidate country status once the priorities indicated in the Commission's conclusion on Georgia's application for membership have been taken into account."
"Each country's progress on the path to the European Union will depend on its own merits in meeting the Copenhagen criteria, including the EU's ability to accept new members," the draft conclusions also say.
This wording suggests that the EU does not intend to bundle Ukraine and Moldova into one package, as it has done with Northern Macedonia and Albania.
Several EU diplomats said that after several days of internal EU discussions, there was not a single country among the 27 EU member states that opposed granting Ukraine candidate status.
On June 17, the European Commission released conclusions on the EU accession applications of Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia, recommending granting candidate status to the first two.
At the same time, the EU prescribed seven requirements for Ukraine to meet in order not to lose its new status and move on to the next stage of the procedure.
