European Commission's report to help us prioritize subsequent policies, decisions - Moldovan foreign minister says

Chisinau, 13 Jan. /MOLDPRES/- Deputy Prime Minister Nicu Popescu, Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration made the following statement:

"The European Commission report discussed in the press is for the time being an internal document and will be officially published later in January.

The document is based on the answers from May to the questionnaire sent by the authorities to the EU and the administrative deficiencies circulated are well known to the public and are due to the slow progress of European integration registered by the previous governments.

It is important to highlight that the representatives of the European Commission strongly recommended to the EU Council to grant our country the status of a candidate country, which clearly demonstrates the progress already made by the current government in the European integration.

We recognize the public interest in the content of the report and the MAEIE as the coordinating authority of the European integration process, together with the national institutions has all the openness and availability to discuss the practical aspects transparently.

We are happy at the current stage to recall that the first part of the European Commission's Opinions was published on June 17, 2022 and covers two chapters - the political and economic criteria.

Part Two – The soon-to-be-published analytical report reflects a detailed balance sheet on each chapter of accession and will look in particular at:

• the level of transposition of the EU acquis in the legislation of our country;

EU policy implementation procedures and mechanisms with a major focus on administrative and institutional capacity;

• the level of cooperation between our country and the European Union.

The new report to be published will assess the current situation in the 33 chapters of EU legislation and will not include progress already made after June.

It is a first for our country to go through an assessment of the requirements for matching with an EU member state and it is obvious, just as we announced previously that the process of European transformation and modernization of our institutions and ensuring administrative training will be a lasting one.

At the same time, the report is an excellent road map that shows the state of affairs in each area and will help us prioritize further policies and decisions.

The authorities have already started identifying the arrears in all accession chapters so that we can move forward quickly, and at the same time we are also implementing the 9 recommendations of the European Commission.

In autumn 2023, the European Commission will also publish the "enlargement package", which will also contain the progress report on the Republic of Moldova.

In 2023 we will achieve even more together!", concluded Popescu.

Photo: MAEIE