President Viktor Yanukovych touted the fact that his first major international meeting of 2011 came with a European Union representative as evidence of his commitment to EU integration.
"It is a wonderful thing that the first international meeting I have this year is the meeting with the representative of European Commission," he said at the opening of a meeting on Jan. 11 with the European Union’s Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighborhood Policy, Stefan Fuele.
Yanukovych’s first foreign trip as president was also to the EU capital of Brussels last year, but he subsequently met much more frequently with his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev and signed a number of deals with Moscow, including prolonging the stay of the Russia Black Sea Fleet in Crimea.
I’m certain that 2011 will become the year of radical reforms."
– Viktor Yanukovych, president of Ukraine.
Negotiations with the EU over a free-trade agreement, on the other hand, continued to drag.
Yanukovych on Jan. 11 expressed hopes for "the long-expected finish of negotiations on an association agreement (between Ukraine and the EU) and the creation of a free trade zone" and promised the European Commissioner to carry out political and economic reforms in 2011.
"I’m certain that 2011 will become the year of radical reforms," Yanukovych said.
"We realize that a major program for economic reforms cannot be carried out without political reforms, without decisive steps to fight corruption and improve transparency in the work of public authorities," he added.
Reporters were asked to leave before Fuele began speaking. He was expected to express concerns to Yanukovych over press freedoms and criminal cases against opposition politicians.
