The pledge to make Ukraine an EU member is nothing more than a virtue-signal.
It’s been quite the performance from the European Union. Just over a week ago, the leaders of the EU’s dominant nations – Germany, France and Italy – enjoyed a day out in Kyiv, posing alongside Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and pledging to support his nation’s quest to join what German chancellor Olaf Scholz called ‘the European family’. This little Ukrainian jaunt, it turned out, was a mere prelude for the EU’s big announcement on Thursday evening. That was when the 27-nation bloc announced that it had finally decided to accept Ukraine’s most recent application for EU membership, made at the start of the war, and grant it ‘candidate’ status. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, dressed in the Ukrainian colours, called Ukraine’s candidature ‘a good day for Europe’. Moldova has also been granted candidate status, but that now seems like a mere afterthought.
