This evening or on Friday, the European Union will provide a final response as to Moldova’s EU accession perspective. Deputy Prime Minister Nicu Popescu said the Moldovan authorities are optimistic that the decision will be favorable to Moldova. The absolute majority of the EU member states support Moldova’s European integration efforts, IPN reports.
Nicu Popescu, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration, said the European integration aspirations of the citizens and authorities’ efforts created a window of opportunity for the Republic of Moldova. During the June 23-24 summit of the European Council, Moldova will receive a clear response as to its accession perspective. The authorities are hopeful this summit will become a historic event for the Republic of Moldova.
“It is recognition of the fact that Moldovan society is a European society that wants to be governed according to the norms of democracy, which rejected the attempt to derail our European course by the clear and firm vote offered to the pro-European forces. We have made important progress the past few months in the fight against corruption, in the energy sector, as regards the freedom of the media. We climbed 49 spots according to the Press Freedom Index. We advanced in the fight against money laundering. We don’t know what decisions the countries will take, but we receive positive messages from the European Commission. The position of the absolute majority of the member states is that they are open and firmly support the granting of the candidate status to the Republic of Moldova. We are very optimistic,” Nicu Popescu stated in the Special Edition on the public TV channel Moldova 1.
The minister said the candidate country status will enable Moldova to receive increased financial support from the member states for raising the living standards of the citizens to the European standards.
“On Thursday evening or on Friday, we hope to take two important steps towards accession. The first step will be the recognition of the accession perspective, while the second step will be the recognition of the candidate status given that we are yet to do reforms. The European Commission formulated a number of recommendations for the reformation process in the Republic of Moldova. These mainly refer to the fight against corruption and the justice sector reform, the fight against organized crime and the public administration reform. These recommendations are logical and anyway form part of our government program. After we take these measures, our hope is to start accession negotiations. When the negotiations are opened, the EU will provide increased financing that will enable us to develop Moldova faster, together with our European partners,” stated the Deputy Prime Minister.
The Republic of Moldova filed an application for EU membership on March 3. Last week, the European Commission recommended that the European Council should grant the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine the EU candidate status. A final decision is to be taken by the leaders of the EU member states by a unanimous vote.
