Finland's prime minister says when Ukraine's EU membership talks could start

Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpos believes that the Ukraine-EU negotiations on our country's membership in the EU may start in December. He said this at a meeting of the party council of the Coalition Party, of which he is a member, Yle reported.

In my opinion, Ukraine has progressed well enough in fulfilling the tasks set before it for EU accession," Orpo said.

He pointed out that in a week's time, the applicant countries should submit official reports on their progress towards membership in the organisation.

We would like to point out that Ukraine-EU negotiations may start in December, the Ukrainian minister for European and Euro-Atlantic integration, Olha Stefanyshyna, said on 26 October. She stressed that Ukraine had created all the necessary conditions for the start of the negotiations by implementing seven EU recommendations and said that Ukraine was confident in the positive decision of the European Commission.

At the same time, Stefanyshyna admitted that some European countries do not want to see Ukraine in the EU and are trying to "bargain", however, the minister stressed that Kiev works with them individually.

It is known that the European Commission intends to present an assessment of Ukraine's progress on 8 November. According to the newspaper, Ukraine's progress in reforms will be assessed positively, but there may be certain additional conditions.