Ukraine's EU accession bid gets boost with launch of joint TF

A joint task force to accelerate Ukraine's accession to the European Union has been officially launched.

The European Commission announced Friday (local time) that it had established the TF to speed up Ukraine's membership process, according to Euronews and other outlets.

The TF will hold two meetings per week to review the requirements Ukraine must fulfill for EU membership and to support their completion. It will focus particularly on rule-of-law and anti-corruption reform benchmarks — key conditions for EU accession — identifying outstanding obligations and helping Ukraine move toward meeting them.

EU Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos said Ukraine is "one of the countries making the most progress toward EU membership," adding that the joint TF was agreed upon after she discussed next steps with Ukrainian Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyy following the opening of two additional negotiating chapters this week.

EU membership candidates must negotiate 35 chapters with the bloc, grouped into six thematic clusters covering areas such as rule of law, security, the environment and agriculture.

With all 27 EU member states agreeing earlier this week to open two additional negotiating chapters, Ukraine is now conducting accession talks in four chapters. The remaining two chapters are expected to begin negotiations before the end of the year.