Negotiations with Ukraine on EU accession should start already this year, says Latvian FM

The European Union should be ready to start accession negotiations with Ukraine already this year, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Latvia, Edgars Rinkēvičs, has said, Delfi reports.

During a meeting in Odesa with his Ukrainian counterpart, Dmytro Kuleba, Rinkēvičs stated that the European Union should be ready to start negotiations on Ukraine's accession to the EU as early as 2023. He noted that this is important both for maintaining the high motivation of Ukrainians in war conditions and for stimulating further reforms in Ukraine.

Rinkēvičs emphasized that for Ukraine "integration into the European Union will require a lot of painstaking work, an important part of which will be the implementation of deep and effective reforms."

Rinkēvičs came to Odesa with the foreign ministers of the Baltic and Scandinavian countries and took part in the opening of the Odesa Recovery Forum. At the opening of the forum, he called it important that Ukraine's integration into the European Union, reforms and post-war recovery become interconnected processes.