EU leaders visiting Kyiv on Friday laid out the ways in which Ukraine will slowly integrate into the bloc, but stopped well short of committing to quick membership.

President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine was meeting the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, and the European Council president, Charles Michel, with a aim of extracting commitments to let Ukraine soon join the bloc’s 27 member nations, which represent about 450 million people.

“Our goal is absolutely clear: to start negotiations on Ukraine’s membership in the EU this year,” Zelensky told the news media on Friday afternoon in Kyiv. “We will not lose a single day in our work to bring Ukraine and the EU closer together.”

The Ukrainian president previously has described EU membership as an unwavering goal for the country, highlighted governmental overhauls he said have been pushed through despite the war and said he expected EU nations to recognize Ukraine’s progress toward membership.

The European leaders repeated promises that Ukraine has a future within the European Union but did not respond to Zelensky’s comment about the country starting negotiations this year.

A joint EU-Ukraine statement released after the meetings in Kyiv said that Ukraine had made efforts towards its bid to join the bloc, and that the European Commission would offer an update in the spring.

In the past few days, the Ukrainian authorities have conducted raids and fired officials in a ramped-up effort to illustrate a commitment to fighting corruption — an area of concern for western allies.

Ukraine stands to receive hundreds of billions of dollars from the EU and other allies, including the US.

New York Times News Service