Stefanishyna: Half of NATO members in favor of granting MAP to Ukraine

"Before the NATO summit, I would like to thank almost half of the Allies who support granting Membership Action Plan to Ukraine. I hope that this decision will be made ... I can confirm that, in fact, half of the Allies are in favor of such a decision,” Stefanishyna said during a press conference within the framework of the forum "Ukraine 30. Ecology", an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

The Deputy Prime Minister is convinced that the most important thing now is to mobilize political unity within the Alliance to reach a decision on Ukraine. In view of this, the high-ranking official noted that Ukraine was holding discussions with Hungary, namely on the issue of national minorities, the United States, the Baltic states, Poland, and other member states.

"In the near future, NATO will approve a 10-year development strategy, and Ukraine's principled position is that the document should be clear about this," she said.

Stefanishyna drew attention to Russia's influence on NATO and the reluctance of countries to "irritate Russia" but she believes that Ukraine should not expect changes in Russia on the path towards the Alliance membership.

My main message is that we should not expect these changes [in Russian leadership]. We must be ready for any changes at any time, and Ukraine’s membership in NATO is one of such elements to accelerate transformations in the Russian Federation itself,” the Deputy Prime Minister believes.

In May, Stefanishyna said that NATO continued to pursue an "open door" policy and continued to support Ukraine in security and defense sector reforms, but a decision on the MAP for Ukraine was unlikely to be made during the summit.

The next NATO summit will take place in Brussels on 14 June.

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