Bill to drop NATO membership goal submitted to Ukrainian parliament

A bill proposing to enshrine neutral status in the constitution and abandon the goal of joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) has been submitted to the Ukrainian parliament.

According to a report by the Strana portal, the proposal was introduced to the parliamentary agenda by lawmaker Anna Skorokhod.

The drafted constitutional amendment stipulates that Ukraine must not participate in military alliances and must confirm that it harbours no aggressive intentions against any state.

The text notes that neutrality status should be registered through “guaranteeing non-participation in any military alliance and confirming the absence of intent to attack any country.”

While the bill submitted by Skorokhod aims to remove the NATO goal from the constitution, it envisages maintaining constitutional guarantees for the country’s course towards full European Union (EU) membership.

NATO goal in constitution took effect in 2019

The strategic goal of EU and NATO membership enshrined in Ukraine’s constitution was adopted in February 2019, during the tenure of then-president Petro Poroshenko.

The constitutional amendments in question obliged the government to implement this course and designated the president as the guarantor of the process.

Poroshenko, who assumed the leadership of the European Solidarity party in May of that year, has led the party ever since.

Advocating Euro-Atlantic integration, Poroshenko described EU and NATO membership in a 2026 assessment as one of the country’s long-term security guarantees.

Moscow insists on neutrality condition

The Moscow administration links a potential resolution to the war in Ukraine to a series of conditions that Kyiv must fulfil.

These conditions include the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions, as well as the international legal recognition of these territories, alongside Crimea and Sevastopol, as Russian soil.

Ukraine’s formal renunciation of NATO membership maintains its weight among Moscow’s primary demands.

Russian officials state that Ukraine’s neutral status must be explicitly included in future agreements.