Exclusive: Romania's President Dan pushes for Moldova and Ukraine’s EU bid, challenging Hungary

Romanian President Nicușor Dan joined a growing movement of EU leaders on Tuesday by announcing that following Moldova’s decisive pro-European vote in Sunday’s parliamentary elections, “technical negotiations” for EU accession will now begin “even if the negotiations are not officially launched,” given Romania’s special relationship with Moldova.

The Romanian president also appears to support an EU challenge to Hungary’s power to veto Ukraine’s EU accession, calling it a question of “loyal EU cooperation”, but he remains hopeful a “middle ground” can be found.

“I hope the negotiations will be officially launched, but if not, they will take place in such a way that, from a structural and administrative point of view, Moldova will be ready for accession as soon as possible,” Dan told Euronews and Euronews Romania in a wide-ranging interview on Tuesday, before heading to the informal EU summit in Copenhagen.

Romania is actively supporting Moldova and Ukraine’s EU accession, President Dan repeated. However, Ukraine’s accession negotiations remain vetoed by Hungary, sparking a political showdown with the rest of the EU states.

“What will happen is that, regardless of the context or the formal timetable for negotiations, many issues will be discussed in technical negotiations with Moldova,” the Romanian president stated firmly.

In the joint interview with Euronews and Euronews Romania, Dan said that there is a typical formal timetable for Moldova and Ukraine’s accession negotiations, but that he is “very, very optimistic that Moldova will join the European Union” after the Moldovans' “absolutely commendable” vote amid a Russian disinformation onslaught.

According to Romania’s president, Russia “exerted pressure on multiple levels” in Moldova, including “narratives such as the ones which say the West is preparing to start a war with Russia or that the people are preparing to go to war”.

“I saw this happening very intensely in Moldova, and the local people judged rationally for their future,” Dan said.

'We must find a way to negotiate for some middle ground'

Yet Dan chose to be more nuanced about the same technical process regarding Ukraine, both because of Hungary’s veto, but also, a novelty, because of what he called a “pending discussion” about agriculture.

According to the Romanian president, “Ukraine has significant agricultural production, which would unbalance the existing (EU) mechanisms."

"On the other hand, Ukraine does not currently meet the standards that we impose on the agricultural sector in the European Union," Dan said.

"So the discussions taking place are that, in terms of agriculture, Ukraine should have a special status so that it can continue to make significant exports to non-European countries while, in all other clusters, it should be treated as an equal."

"Of course, Ukraine currently has an even bigger problem, but one that concerns us all, namely the war," he pointed out.

But, even if Romania has strong relations with Hungary, the Romanian president chose to be crystal clear about Hungary’s veto regarding Ukraine.

“We must find a way to negotiate” for “some middle ground,” Dan said. However, ultimately the whole political clash comes down to “loyal cooperation” of EU countries together, coupled with the principle of sovereignty.

“In my opinion, at least at this point, there is no question of eliminating the veto power of countries, in principle. But on certain issues that are, so to speak, more operational, we must of course be able to make decisions,” the Romanian leader said in no uncertain terms in the interview with Euronews and Euronews Romania.

In his logic, “the Treaty on European Union requires, and this is also expressly stated, loyal cooperation. A systematic veto does not mean loyal cooperation. However, establishing this means going to the Court of Justice, which takes time, and that is why we need to find diplomatic ways to move forward,” President Dan told Euronews.

He added that this situation is linked to “an old debate within the union about the decision-making process,” namely that “this principle of unanimity reflects a principle of sovereignty.”

“When countries joined the European Union, the guarantee was, or at least the treaty said, that they were sovereign countries. And then deciding for other countries on behalf of one country would be a violation of sovereignty. That is one extreme," Dan pointed out.

"The other extreme is that when, for example, we talk about money, yes, it is very legitimate for countries that contribute financially to have a say, that countries that do not contribute or contribute very little should not be able to block a process of directing funds to a cause that many countries want."

"Here, obviously, I think it is legitimate that there should be no possibility of veto. And now, between these two extremes, there is politics, we have politics within the European Union. We must find a way to negotiate,” Romania’s president concluded.

Romania is among the eastern European countries whose airspace has been violated by the Russian Federation over the last weeks.

Romania's Dan praised “the very, very quick and concrete response from NATO member countries” to these violations, saying that the response sent “a message to the citizens of these countries that things are under control.”

When asked about Romania’s strategy to counter the Russian incursions into Romania’s airspace, Dan said that following legislation upgrades Romania now has “the type of response that defines our countermeasures” which involves “Romanian air forces on missions in other countries and foreign air forces on missions in Romania, precisely to send a signal of deterrence for any kind of possible attack.”