We agree that we may agree at some unspecified point in the future

LAST week Brussels, the capital of European non-events, hosted another meeting between European Union and Ukrainian diplomats. On 30th March they initialled an "Association Agreement". That does not mean they signed it.

Eh? In diplo-speak, to "initial" is a technical act implying approval of the contents of the document. The agreement, all 1,200 pages of it, is hardly bedtime reading, but it would at least provide a new framework for EU-Ukrainian relations. It would require Ukraine to partly adopt EU legislation (the acquis communautaire), and would significantly deepen trade relations.

No one is speaking of EU membership for Ukraine. But the agreement is still a landmark in the country's European integration. At least, say some, it should help distance Ukraine from Russia, which is carrying out its own experiments in "Eurasian" integration.

Still, the "initialling" is little more than a tuft of grass on the barren steppe of EU-Ukrainian relations. Plans to sign the agreement at an EU-Ukraine summit last December dissipated after Yulia Tymoshenko, the opposition politician, was imprisoned for abuse of office during her time as prime minister. The EU saw the move as politically motivated.

Pavlo Klimkin, the diplomat representing Ukraine last week, says he believes that it is “entirely technically and politically possible” that the agreement will be signed within a year. But yesterday Germany was making distinctly sceptical noises.

It is not the only country with concerns. Last month the foreign ministers of five EU members wrote to the International Herald Tribune bemoaning Ukraine's deteriorating democracy, which they said was “incompatible with Ukraine's European choice”. Britain's William Hague, Germany's Guido Westerwelle and Poland's Radek Sikorski do not join forces every day.

Two weeks later Ukraine's foreign minister, Konstyantyn Gryshchenko, published a diplomatic response. But perhaps the most telling aspect of this is that the EU's dialogue with Ukraine is being conducted via the pages of an American newspaper.

With Europeans showing an interest in values again, it could take years for the EU-Ukraine agreement to pass—especially now that Ms Tymoshenko is facing further criminal charges.

Moreover, both sides have other concerns. Brussels did not bother to organise a press conference after the initialling. Ukrainian politicians are busy bartering in the run-up to parliamentary elections scheduled for October. Still, “European integration remains Ukraine's unchanging priority”, President Viktor Yanukovich told readers of the Polish publication Gazeta Prawna on Sunday.

Mr Gryshchenko provided a more colourful vision in his mini-manifesto for Ukrainian weekly Dzerkalo Tyzhnia last month. Evoking Bismarck, he called for a new, pragmatic approach to European policy. Even without the offer of membership, he said, the EU can provide Ukraine with “instruction in building our own comfortable edifice”; a framework for domestic reforms.

There are tests on both sides. Ukraine wants the EU to liberalise its visa regime and become more welcoming to Ukrainian citizens. The EU wants Ukraine's October elections to be democratic. Neither side has much leverage over the other, or hope of success.