KIEV — Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, fighting to stay in contention in a weekend presidential election, set the ambitious goal Thursday of taking the country into the European Union within five years.
"We are building Europe in Ukraine, and this means a deep and systematic transformation," Tymoshenko, trailing former Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych in the last permitted opinion polls, told a news conference.
"I will do everything so that during the five years when I will be president, Ukraine becomes a member of the EU," she said.
President Viktor Yushchenko made membership of the EU and NATO a cornerstone of his foreign policy after he was swept to power by the 2004 Orange Revolution.
But EU enthusiasm for Ukraine has turned to frustration at the constant political turmoil that has rocked the country since 2004, especially the bitter and debilitating disputes between former allies Yushchenko and Tymoshenko.
The EU does not officially recognize Ukraine as a candidate. The EU is still assimilating 12 mostly former communist central European states that it admitted in 2004 and 2007, and few believe that Ukrainian membership within five years is remotely realistic.
Tymoshenko, who has established cordial ties with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, also on Thursday defended a gas contract that she reached with Russia.
"Ukraine, as a gas transit state, is and will be a reliable partner, and the contract that was signed between Ukraine and Russia for 10 years is the legal basis of this stability and predictability," she said.
Putin and Tymoshenko put an end to a three-week dispute over gas prices in January 2009 by signing a 10-year gas supply deal. The so-called "gas war" led to supply cuts to Europe, leaving millions out in the cold and shutting down factories.
Yanukovych and Yushchenko have both criticized the deal as forcing Ukraine to pay too much for gas and said they wanted to renegotiate its terms.
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