Originally Posted by Steve_ (Post 11190359)

That agreement they just signed is pretty much de facto EU membership, from what I read it's got more to it than EFTA membership although there is no free movement of people.

Yeah, that's what stopped Romania and Bulgaria from joining, after all. :p

The reason they haven't joined is because Germany opposes it, because they're worried about having a large muslim country in the EU and having a lot of Turks move to Germany. If it hadn't of been for the recession, I reckon they'd be members by now.

Originally Posted by Shard (Post 11190387)

The whole EU worries about that with Turkey. Although, ironically, Turkish muslims would probably moderate the devout muslims from other parts.

Originally Posted by burks (Post 11190520)

EU membership for Ukraine is still quite a few years away yet. Let's see what their elections bring first.

The Romania and Bulgaria examples are great ones as to why the EU shouldn't rush into expanding. The Ukrainian economy needs more stability. This agreement may go some way to helping, with a free trade area within 10 years, and exchange in intellect etc. But lets see what happens to the billions of dollars the world is about to pump into the Ukrainian govt. over next couple years and see if it happens to coincide with an influx of country estate popping up all around Kiev!

I would quite like to see Ukraine join the EU though, I liked it there when I visited and would definitely go back (just not right now!).