Eurasia Press & News
The official talks on the new agreement with the EU will start on January 12, Moldova’s Foreign Minister Iurie Leanca said in a news conference held in Bucharest after a meeting with his Romanian counterpart Catalin Predoiu.
“We hope the new agreement will be called association agreement and when we finish the talks the preamble of the document will contain a phrase about Moldova’s European prospects. However, we realize that for this to happen, we must do our homework,” Iurie Leanca said.
The Moldovan Premier stressed that the future talks will be based on three important aspects: the dialogue on political and security-related problems, liberalization of the visa regime and the extensive free trade agreement.
“We aim to convince our EU partners, and we count a lot on the Romanian colleagues’ support in this respect, to make a decision to open the talks on the liberalization of the visa regime by the end of this year and on the new extensive free trade agreement,” the Moldovan Foreign Minister said.
Speaking about the ‘homework’, Iurie Leanca said that Moldova must promote such important reforms as the reorganization of the state institutions, separation of the powers in the state, ensuring of the independence of the judiciary, ensuring of the freedom of the media, re-monopolization of the economic system so that it becomes competitive and attracts investments, etc.
“When we achieve most of the set objectives or at least mark a positive trajectory, the dialogue with our EU partners will be much easier,” Leanca said.
