Many EU countries oppose Kiev jumping the line to join the bloc, the Italian PM said

Only Rome supports giving Ukraine candidate status in the European Union, which is just not in the cards right now, with all the other major EU members opposed, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi revealed. EU officials will try to draft a fast-track proposal for how Kiev could join sometime in June, he added.

“Almost all the major EU member countries are against giving Ukraine candidate status – except Italy. Candidate status is currently not predictable due to the opposition of these countries”, - Draghi said at a press conference in Brussels.

He added that he could “imagine” that the European Commission would present a plan to fast-track Ukraine’s application for future candidate status at a meeting in June.

Prime Minister noted that most countries wait for years to become candidates, let alone for EU membership itself, and that the EU has proposed various other arrangements to “sweeten the pill”, but none of them were acceptable to the government in Kiev.