What does Ukraine need to do in order to receive the visa waiver regime?

Last week Stefan Fuele, European Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighborhood Policy, and Kostiantyn Hryshchenko, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, signed the supplement to the already existing agreement on visa regime simplification. After this document had been signed, Hryshchenko himself posted to Twitter: “The agreement will become an important step to our key goal – the establishment of visa-free regime with the EU for Ukrainian citizens.”

It is true, from now on the list of people who can receive a visa through a simplified system has been significantly expanded. Moreover, members of NGOs, professionals who participate in the international forums, representatives of religious communities, and participants of programs of cross-border cooperation with the EU are granted access to the facilitated visa system.

However, not so long ago it seemed that this supplement was not going to be signed. When the European Commission submitted this document to the EU Council on July 5, Brussels was shaken by arguments. A part of the European MPs (Elmar Brok, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, was, probably, the most active among them) strongly opposed the fact that according to the new text of the Agreement, free five-year multiple entry visas will be given to oblast and Verkhovna Rada deputies, Constitutional and Supreme Court judges, and even prosecutors of the national and regional level, and their assistants. They also opposed the general signing of the Agreement at this point of time. “I welcome the facilitation for the representatives of civil society. But this Agreement should not include privileges for diplomats and Yanukovych’s regime henchmen. This has come out of the blue! Brussels’ criticism of Yanukovych looks like a theater play,” Brok commented on his stand.

Meanwhile, Pawel Kowal, head of the European Parliament Delegation for Relations with Ukraine, urged the EU Council to sign the amendments to the Agreement on visa regime facilitation with Ukraine, thus “sending a strong signal to the Ukrainian people, that despite the political obstacles, the EU is ready to actively support their expectations.”

As we can see, the Supplement to the Agreement was signed. And it seems that after two years of stagnation (negotiations between Ukraine and the EU on establishing a visa-free system began in October 2010) we can finally observe some meaningful results, at least for a part of the society. Though the majority of people, those who do not belong to the governmental or civil structures, are not going to experience any difference. The Day asked the experts which steps should be taken for all Ukrainians to receive visas through a facilitated system, or for the visa regime to be cancelled at all, as it was originally planned.

Both foreign and domestic analysts state that Ukraine will be able to actively move towards the visa-free regime after the internal political situation is put to order and the system of biometric passports is established (by the way, the last matter is put on pause).

So, expert at the Brussels Center for European Policy Studies Michael Emmerson stated in his commentary to The Day that it would be better to separate the matter of politically motivated imprisonments, like the Tymoshenko case, and the matter of visa regime liberalization, and move on in the direction of the latter. But, according to him, a big number of the EU officials are afraid that the visa-free regime might be viewed as Yanukovych’s political triumph, and this would only increase the pressure on Tymoshenko and the opposition in general. Despite this, the Party of Regions members think there is no relation between the Tymoshenko case and the establishment of the visa-free system between Ukraine and the countries of the European Union (and this is proven by the recently signed Supplement to the Agreement). Moreover, this does not affect the level of democracy in the country at all. “As far as I know, Tymoshenko case is not included into the Action Plan designed for Ukraine. The only obstacle that stands in the way of fulfilling of the second stage of the Plan is the biometric passports matter, which is not yet solved,” said the Party of Regions deputy Leonid Kozhara.

“Ukraine is the only country that still does not issue biometric passports to its citizens, since the majority in the parliament is not consolidated enough to vote for this law,” Oleksandr Sushko, head of the Euro-Atlantic Cooperation Institute explains the situation. “Today we have lobbying groups that are interested in slowing this project down, so practically the government shows its inability to enact this law. That is why I cannot say with certainty when the situation will change, since even such a simple task like the establishment of biometric passports is too challenging for Ukraine.”

However, it would be naive to hope that the introduction of biometric passports would instantly open the doors to the European Union for us. The establishment of a visa-free regime for Ukrainians directly depends on the political factor, especially on the level of democracy and the human rights observance. And since there is still much to be achieved in these areas, it is natural that Brussels does not want to give priority to the establishment of a visa-free regime at this stage. The improvements will take place only when the situation in Ukrainian society is changed.

Taras Chornovil, deputy head of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Foreign Affairs, said in the conversation with The Day: “At this time there is a number of political and social problems, and we have to understand that granting Ukraine the visa-free regime is possible only after these problems are solved, and our Western partners are assured that after this regime is established, there will not be an uncontrolled flow of illegal migrants from Ukraine. And until we show some more or less adequate results in our social policy, especially in the area of employment, and while the number of people who state they are ready to leave Ukraine at any given moment and move to the Western Europe exceeds all possible limits, we cannot count on a good result.”