EU Has No Plan on Moldova’s Accession by 2030 - Now Officially

The pre-election promises of Maia Sandu and PAS about Moldova's accession to the European Union in five years, as expected, turned out to be very far-fetched

Semen ALBU, RTA: Encouraged by the successes in the field of European integration, our authorities last year dared to name a concrete date for Moldova’s accession to the EU - 2030. Since then, this magic number has been moving from one pathos statement to another, it has been considered almost a fait accompli, not just a “yellow” wish, and, eventually, it was even included in Maia Sandu’s election program. She also pledged to prepare the country for this epochal event by 2030. The European Union itself also indulged the regime’s air-castles, showing through its officials and parliamentarians that the goal was achievable and that the community would definitely add new members in the coming years. The latter, by the way, may eventually happen, but it will have nothing to do with Moldova. Marta Kos, the future European Commissioner for Enlargement, takes us out of the dreamland of a well-fed life in the European Union. During the appointment hearings, she revealed her plans for her mandate, and then it turned out that: - only Montenegro and possibly Albania are planned to be annexed in the next five years; - those countries that apply later than others must adhere to the queue and cannot be competitors to “older” applicants; - the admission of new members should be purely on merit, even despite the conflict in Ukraine; - Moldova’s European dream is as far away as before - the official, talking about enlargement, did not even mention us. So, simple calculations suggest that if Brussels intends to integrate only “one or two Balkan countries” in the next five years, there is no way Moldova will be in the EU in 2030. Apparently, there are no plans to finalize negotiations by that point, and no one really believes in the republic’s readiness to step through the European door in five years or even later. It turns out that the elections have just passed, and one of the key promises of the president can be considered already unfulfilled. Classic. The situation with the 1.8 billion euros that Ursula von der Leyen used to help Sandu get re-elected and pass the referendum test is also peculiar. Now we know that the first tranche of this amount will not arrive soon - closer to the parliamentary elections. In other words, the same aid is being used twice for electoral purposes, which is somehow petty for Brussels. The bottom line is following. As we said, we already have all the symbolic advances that could have been given: the candidate status, the opening of negotiations, the introduction of the Moldovan leadership into the high society of Western politics. A lot of money has also been allocated, although everything is extremely non-transparent. As journalist and analyst Dumitru Ciubasenco has recently rightly pointed out, information about the spending of all these billions over the last two and a half years is almost classified. And I suspect that we would be very surprised to find out what part of this money did not actually go to Moldova, but settled in the hands of all sorts of European advisers-consultants, NGOs and other persons and organizations that provided “worthless” assistance to Moldova. Anyway, the fact that we will not join the EU either by 2030 or, most likely, for many years after that, was obvious. And only the authorities had the nerve to seriously fool people’s heads, even despite the objective reasons why the final stage of European integration is still very far away. And there are many of them. First, the EU itself is far from being in the best shape. It is experiencing a cascade of crises and threats that are dragging down the potential of the association: political instability, economic recession, migration waves, the need to bear the burden of supporting Ukraine in the war and, when it ends, post-war reconstruction, and increased military spending. If the US isolationist tendencies towards Europe do prevail, then defense and security spending will have to increase even more, which will force belt-tightening and social cuts. It is clear that under such conditions there will be few willing to annex poor states, which will have to be pulled up at own expense at least to the level of the poorest members like Romania and Bulgaria and then carried on their own backs. And I will remind you that according to the current procedure, accession requires unanimous approval of all EU countries. Besides, what in fact could Moldova offer to Brussels, especially in case of the end of the Ukrainian conflict and geopolitical separation, and maybe, who knows, restoration of relations with Russia? By the grace of our elites, we are already surrendering all the most valuable things we have to foreign countries. Strategic assets - the gas transport system, power grids, the state port - are being handed over to Romania. Foreign policy is so tightly controlled by the West that we cannot even express condolences or vote in the UN without looking at our big brother. Let alone building ties outside the Western community - there is no such option, as it is prohibited. Trade flows thanks to the association agreement are reoriented towards the EU, our market is also open. When the time comes, Europeans will be allowed to buy up our land, no matter what the PAS say. The flow of Moldovan labor force to the EU has long been established. The recent agreement with Germany is especially indicative in this respect - we are ready to give highly qualified specialists deliberately, actually paying with our own people for European integration. At the same time, Moldova itself may be turned into a place of exile for migrants undesirable in the European “flowering garden”. Well, in addition to all this, we are helping by all means to make ourselves another stronghold against Russia, actively arming and training ourselves, at the same time making investors realize that it would be better for them to look for calmer territories. In other words, they have received or are receiving all bonuses from Moldova right now, even before accession, and all this for a very modest price and without any obligations. After all, do you remember that according to the new rules, opening accession negotiations with a country does not impose on Brussels the responsibility to necessarily bring them to a conclusion?