Hungary has blocked the opening of new negotiation clusters for Ukraine within the EU
During a meeting of the EU Council’s Working Group on Enlargement (COELA), Hungary blocked the launch of the procedure to open negotiation clusters No. 2 and No. 3 for Ukraine as part of the European Union accession process.
According to EU sources, Budapest agreed to support the opening of Negotiation Cluster No. 3 only for Moldova, but most member states opposed separating the negotiation processes for Ukraine and Moldova.
As a result, due to a lack of consensus, no decision was made. The issue is scheduled to be reconsidered at the next COELA meeting, which will take place on July 22.
This will be the working group’s last meeting before the summer break. After the summer break, experts on EU enlargement will reconvene on September 1.
Hungary has restored access to a number of Ukrainian news websites that had been blocked in response to reciprocal restrictions imposed by Kyiv. The decision marks a step toward partially unblocking the flow of information between the countries following the media conflict.
Hungary initiated the removal of language regarding Ukraine’s accelerated accession to the EU from the final declaration of the European Union summit.
