Ukraine Corruption Worries Cloud Its Push to Join EU

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Key Points

The European Union will recommend on Wednesday that the bloc begins membership talks with Ukraine soon, boosting President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has made EU accession a central goal..

The war with Russia has become bogged down, and tensions between Zelensky and his top military leaders have spilled into public display..

Speaking at Ukraines parliament last weekend, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Kyiv had met 90% of the tasks set, praising the country for advancing judicial reforms, strengthening anticorruption institutions and media-freedom laws and taking steps to tighten money-laundering restrictions and curb oligarchs influence on public life..

Daria Kaleniuk, director of the Kyiv-based Anticorruption Action Center, a group campaigning to root out graft, said the urgency of combating corruption has grown because so many people have relatives injured or fighting on the front lines and there is an understanding that stolen funds could be used to save the lives of Ukrainian troops..

Oleksandr Yabchanka, a wounded Ukrainian serviceman who wrote a petition that gathered 80,000 signatures within 24 hours and prompted Zelensky to veto the bill, said the publics ability to influence decision makers is proof of Ukraines democratic credentials..

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