Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko welcomed several top-level officials to the Ukrainian capital on July 12, as a two-day Ukraine-European Union Summit started in Kyiv. European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and European Council President Donald Tusk arrived in Kyiv bearing gifts and presenting Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko with a finalized and ratified Ukraine-EU Association agreement.
Poroshenko also expressed gratitude for the EU’s support in his country’s conflict with Russia, which annexed the Ukrainian Crimea peninsula in 2014 and ignited a war in the Donbas that has since claimed more than 10,000 lives. Poroshenko also thanked the EU for extending its economic sanctions against Russia and for its “clearly articulated message that the sanctions will remain in place” until Russia reverses the actions that had triggered them.
The summit ended with no joint declaration, which is unusual for a meeting of this level. Instead, Juncker and Tusk commented that they both “support” Ukraine’s European aspirations.
