15:35 31.03.2015

Ukraine vows to meet visa-free travel requirements by Eastern Partnership summit

2 min read
Ukraine vows to meet visa-free travel requirements by Eastern Partnership summit

Ukraine is ready to meet technical requirements for visa-free travel to the European Union by the Eastern Partnership summit and is expecting the EU to send a political signal of its preparedness to take this step, said deputy chief of the Ukrainian presidential administration Dmitry Shymkiv.

"Ukraine is tasked to comply with technical requirements for the visa-free travel regime set out by the EU before the Riga summit. There is not a single reason why Ukraine cannot do that. The visa-free regime is a question of political debates in the European community," Shymkiv said at a press briefing in Kyiv on Tuesday.

In turn, presidential representative for peace settlement in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions Iryna Heraschenko pointed to "the political aspect related to the war in Donbas".

"Obviously, the war is a factor which is not inspiring optimism of the European side. But Ukraine needs to fulfill every commitment and demonstrate that it does the homework. It takes two to hold dialogue, so we are expecting you [the EU] to send a political message indicating when it [the visa-free travel regime] can happen," Heraschenko said.

"We should appeal to the world and say that contemporary Ukraine is more European than many other countries, and our citizens, Ukrainians, should receive a positive political message from EU states," Heraschenko said.

Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine Jan Tombinski said earlier that Ukraine would not be granted the visa-free travel regime at the Eastern Partnership summit in Riga in May.

He said later that the European Commission would make a visa-free travel request to European countries on the basis of the opinion of experts working in Ukraine.

Riga will host the European Partnership summit on May 21-22.

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