KIEV, Ukraine, Oct. 11 (UPI) -- The European Union aims to help support Ukraine's ability to make sovereign decisions through association, the neighborhood policy commissioner said Friday.
Ukraine aspires to a closer relationship with the European Union. Members of the EU will consider association during a meeting next month in Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital.
EU Neighborhood Policy Commissioner Stefan Fule spoke Friday at a conference on the partnership in Kiev. He said an association agreement and free trade agreement would bring comprehensive change to the region.
"I call it a game changer," he said.
Fule said claims association and free trade agreements translated to EU control over Kiev were "absolute nonsense."
"We are not taking anything from your sovereignty, it will be actually strengthened," he said.
He said Ukraine still needs to show it can make progress but its fate is in its own hands.
The EU has expressed concerned about political reforms in Ukraine. The imprisonment of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, leader of the country's 2005 revolution, and her supporters is viewed by the EU as a case of selective justice. She was sentenced in 2011 to seven years in prison on charges of abuse of office in a gas deal with Russia's Gazprom.
