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BRUSSELS, Belgium — Ukraine's EU membership bid does not need to advance "as soon as possible" anymore, according to the latest draft conclusions of the Oct. 15-16 summit of EU leaders in Brussels, due to pressure from Bulgaria and Hungary.
Ahead of each summit, common conclusions are prepared in advance by the 27 EU countries, and can keep changing until the end of the gathering.
In the draft conclusions dated Oct. 13, the text read "The European Council ... looks forward to the opening of all the other clusters as soon as possible, in line with the merit-based approach," read the draft conclusions.
The EU just unlocked an additional two enlargement clusters — to-do lists of reforms that Ukraine must complete to join the bloc — on Oct. 13, and it is expected that the remaining two will be opened in December.
But the draft conclusions as they stand on Oct. 14 no longer contain the words "as soon as possible."
Three national diplomats have confirmed that Bulgaria and Hungary were the countries to push for the removal of this wording, with the main justification being to keep it the same as in June.
June was when EU leaders last met, and Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar led a successful push to scrap the reference to advancing Ukraine's EU membership bid "as soon as possible" then too.
But the latest move is nonetheless surprising as Hungary's bilateral issue with Ukraine over minority rights has been resolved, and there are no publicly known objections to Kyiv opening the remaining two clusters.
The change was also made to the part of the draft conclusions concerning Moldova, whose EU accession process leaders handcuffed to Ukraine for the opening of the enlargement clusters.
There were at least three other smaller changes to the draft conclusions concerning Ukraine: a reference to "member-state vessels" being attacked in the Black Sea, stronger wording on the return of children — describing them now as "unlawfully deported," and a reference to Ukraine's financing.
Now the draft conclusions read that leaders "will revert to the issue in a timely manner," which could be interpreted as setting the stage for a serious exchange over Russian immobilized assets, that some think could dominate discussion at the December summit.