On July 18, 2023, Razumkov Centre hosted a mixed round table on the topic "Guarantees of irreversibility of the European and Euro-Atlantic trajectory of Ukraine", where Razumkov Centre’s policy paper "Guarantees of irreversibility of the European and Euro-Atlantic trajectory of Ukraine: constitutional and legal aspects" was presented (July, 2023).
Opening the round-table meeting, the Razumkov Centre President and editor-in-chief of the National Security & Defencejournal Yury Yakymenko noted that the heroic resistance of the Ukrainian people to Russian aggression has been going on for more than five hundred days, and this war is, first of all, a war for the very right of the Ukrainian people and the Ukrainian state to exist, for its future, its identity, while Ukraine's European and Euro-Atlantic choices have become its inseparable attributes, and Ukrainians' support for this path has only strengthened during the war years. That is why Razumkov Centre in its July policy paper focused on ensuring the irreversibility of Ukraine's European and Euro-Atlantic course, in particular, its constitutional and legal aspects.
Presenting Razumkov Centre’s policy paper "Guarantees of irreversibility of the European and Euro-Atlantic trajectory of Ukraine: constitutional and legal aspects", Petro Stetsiuk (Razumkov Centre research fellow on legal issues, retired judge of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine) paid special attention to the peculiarities of the legal nature of the constitutional provisions regarding of Ukraine’s strategic path, the need to improve the mechanism of its practical implementation, as well as the socio-political significance of the European and Euro-Atlantic trajectory of Ukraine for its overall constitutional development. Discussing the problems of the July policy paper of Razumkov Centre, the co-director of foreign policy and international security programmes of Razumkov Centre Mykhailo Pashkov focused on the peculiarities of Ukraine's full accession to the European Union, the positive dynamics of public support for it in Ukraine. Instead, Razumkov Centre’s military programmes director Mykola Sungurovsky dwelt upon the specifics of Ukraine's accession to NATO, the state of its Armed Forces and their readiness to operate in line with the alliance's standards.
The speeches of the foreign contributors, Ingrida Danėlienė and Krzysztof Eckhardt, aroused considerable interest among the round table participants. The Head of the Department of Social Sciences of the European Humanities University (Vilnius, Lithuania) Ingrida Danėlienė, in particular, compared the constitutional and legal provisions of the European and Euro-Atlantic integration of Ukraine and Lithuania, and also spoke about the peculiarities of the activities of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania in this area. The Head of the Department of Constitutional and International Law at the Higher School of Law and Administration in Rzeszów (Poland) Krzysztof Eckhardt noted the peculiarities of legislative regulation of the process of Poland's integration in the EU and NATO, the activities of the Constitutional Tribunal of the Republic of Poland in this domain and the natural difficulties of the socio-economic plan, directly related to Poland’s admission to the common European economic space.
Ilona Khmeleva (a non-residential fellow at the University of Toronto, Secretary of the Economic Security Council of Ukraine, coordinator of the project "Ukraine in Europe: Parliamentary Dimension"), Oleg Martseliak (Professor of the Constitutional Law Department at Taras Shevchenko Kyiv National University), Ihor Zhdanov (President of the Open Politics Foundation), Serhiy Dzherzh (Chairman of the Ukraine-NATO Association) and others took part in the discussion of Razumkov Centre's policy paper. They also focused on the content and legal nature of the constitutional provisions regarding the irreversibility of Ukraine's European and Euro-Atlantic course, the state of their implementation, prospects of Ukraine's full membership in the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, as well as the use of foreign experience of joining the EU and NATO.
The discussion took place on the Razumkov Centre Zoom platform and was broadcast on the Razumkov Centre YouTube channel. It was held in the Ukrainian and English languages.
The event was organised by Razumkov Centre as part of the "Engage!" Public Activity Promotion Program funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and implemented by Pact in Ukraine. The content of the event is the sole responsibility of Pact and its partners and does not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the US government.
