Five years ago, on December 23, 2014, Ukraine’s Parliament – the Verkhona Rada – voted to abandon the country’s neutral “non-bloc” status and set a course for NATO membership. The legislation was submitted by President Petro Poroshenko and passed by a vote of 303 “yes” votes in the 450-seat chamber.
The change in the law on domestic and foreign policy was explained that Ukraine’s non-bloc status that was codified under then-President Viktor Yanukovych in 2010 had left Ukraine vulnerable to “external aggression and pressure,” noting that “the Russian Federation’s aggression against Ukraine, its illegal annexation of Crimea…, its military intervention in eastern regions” and other forms of pressure created the need for “more effective guarantees of independence, sovereignty, security and territorial integrity.”