Moldova has pulled ahead of Ukraine in the race to join the European Union, according to the European Commission's 2026 enlargement package, unveiled in Brussels on 4 November, with Chișinău now seen as able to close 25 accession chapters in 2027 while Kyiv lags behind on corruption reforms.

The package, presented by foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas and Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos, introduces indicative accession roadmaps for the four frontrunners — Montenegro, Albania, Moldova and Ukraine — for the first time. Membership still depends on reforms, negotiations and the approval of all 27 member states.

Moldova and Ukraine were granted candidate status together in June 2022, and their bids have been tied together since then. Both have now opened four negotiation clusters in four months, with two remaining, covering the green agenda and resources, agriculture and cohesion. But the Commission said Moldova had met the rule-of-law benchmark, while Ukraine had shown little to no progress on corruption and organised crime reforms.

Different timelines

The Commission said that if all clusters open this year, Moldova could provisionally close 25 chapters in 2027, and its negotiations could be concluded by early 2028. Ukraine has set itself an ambitious goal of closing all chapters by the end of 2028, but a Commission official said that at its current pace it would not meet that target, and the two countries were likely to go separate ways once all clusters are unlocked.

Montenegro remains the frontrunner overall, on track to join in 2028. Elsewhere, progress has stalled: Serbia's negotiations have been at a standstill since December 2021, and Georgia remains a candidate "on paper only", in Kos's words, because of democratic backsliding.