WTO embraces Ukraine

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko may allow himself a shiver of schadenfreude this week.

Ukraine's WTO membership should be endorsed by the trade body's General Council on Tuesday. This would allow the former Soviet republic, a highly productive agricultural and steel economy, to enter ahead of Russia. Kiev may then complicate Moscow's own long-standing accession bid by setting new conditions as a member. Under WTO rules each existing member can block new members from joining unless they make trade reforms. Relations between Russia and Ukraine have been strained since the "Orange Revolution" in Ukraine in 2004.

Ukraine will have until July 4 to ratify the policies it agreed to as part of its entry. It would then officially become a member 30 days later.

Kiev's western integration drive resumes apace after the pro-western Yulia Tymoshenko took over as premier late last year. A pro-European foreign policy is back on course: Ukraine hopes to have completed a new free-trade agreement with the EU by mid-2008 and to start negotiations this year for visa-free travel for Ukrainians to the EU. And earlier this month, Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko, Tymoshenko and Parliament Speaker Arseniy Yatsenyuk signed a formal request asking for Ukraine's bid for the Membership Action Plan to be considered at a NATO meeting in Romania in April, a crucial step on the road to joining the alliance.

Ukraine's NATO bid faces strong opposition from Moscow, which has been angered by the organisation's eastward expansion and deployments close to its borders and argues that the alliance is a Cold War relic that should be replaced by other international security arrangements.