Baker McKenzie LLP attorneys based in Ukraine helped prepare the war-torn country's application to join the European Union, which was submitted last month during the ongoing Russian invasion.

About a dozen attorneys mostly based in Kyiv and Lviv worked pro bono on Ukraine's bid to join the bloc. The country officially applied on Feb. 28 in a move highlighting its turn away from Russia, which had attacked just days before, and toward Western Europe. The attorneys helped complete a questionnaire about Ukraine's corporate laws — including market entry and exit, business regulations, corporate governance, laws governing subsidiaries of foreign companies, bankruptcy procedures and more — and the conformity of Ukrainian law to that of the EU.

"Our team is proud of contributing to the finalization of the documents purporting to achieve the EU candidate status for our country," Kyiv managing partner Serhiy Chorny said in a statement. "Ukraine regains its membership in the European family by overcoming many challenges, including the war with the Russian aggressors. No doubt that this war will be won by Ukraine, and no doubt that Ukraine will become a very central and influential member of the European community. We lawyers do our small work to achieve this goal faster."

Chorny led the team that worked on the questionnaire, which also included partner Hennadiy Voytsitskyi and associates Bogdan Dyakovych, Hanna Smyrnova, Olga Gavrylyuk, Oleksandr Savvi, Mykyta Stebliuk, Tetyana Zhuravska, Polina Korotka, Olha Sviatenka and Veronika Kalyta.

The team worked on the first and second parts of a three-part questionnaire, which Ukraine received in April and returned to the European Commission on May 12. Each candidate country's questionnaire is different, and the team declined to comment on the contents of the survey. The questionnaires, however, tend to be comprehensive. Georgia, which is also applying for membership in the bloc, publicly shared part one of the questionnaire it had received, with 369 questions covering everything from the procedure to amend the country's constitution to the privatization of state-owned companies.

Baker McKenzie's office in the Ukrainian capital suspended its operations for three weeks following the Feb. 24 Russian invasion, with some staffers relocating elsewhere in Ukraine and Europe. While the office is now open, employees are largely working from their homes or temporary residences in Ukraine or in the firm's offices in such cities as Berlin, Brussels, Zurich, London and Warsaw, Poland. About 20 employees are working from Kyiv, the firm said.

This isn't the first time the firm's local attorneys and staff have assisted the Ukrainian government. The office's founding partner, Ukrainian-American lawyer John Hewko, helped draft sections of the Ukrainian constitution in the 1990s, the firm told Law360. In recent years, Baker McKenzie said it has helped harmonize Ukrainian law with that of the European Union, including laws on electronic receipts and regulations on the construction sector. It also helped develop legislation on public-private partnerships for infrastructure in the country.

Ukraine's application for EU membership came in the same time frame as Georgia's and another country within Russia's sphere of influence, Moldova. Ukraine, however, may benefit from an accelerated timeline for EU membership, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyden indicated at an April 8 press conference. 

"It will be not as usual a matter of years to form this opinion, but I think a matter of weeks if we work closely together," von der Leyden said as she ceremonially handed over the candidacy questionnaire to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Ukraine says it expects to have its membership approved in June during the next meeting of the European Council. The newest member of the bloc, Croatia, joined in 2013, 10 years after it applied for membership in 2003.

Membership in the EU must be approved unanimously by all 27 current member countries. Although the bloc has sent copious military aid, weapons and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine, members are split on fast-tracking Ukraine's membership, it emerged in a March 10 meeting in Versailles, France.

Some power broker countries of the EU, including France, Germany and Belgium, are bearish on the prospect. But eight countries in Central and Eastern Europe, including Bulgaria, Slovenia, Poland, the Czech Republic and the Baltic states, support Ukraine joining the union.

Spokespeople for the European Commission did not respond to requests for comment as of Friday.

Baker McKenzie has a long history not only in Ukraine but also in Russia, where it has had a presence since before the fall of the Soviet Union. Following Russia's invasion, the firm in March announced the spinoff of its Moscow and St. Petersburg offices into a separate law firm. Lawyers in those offices have represented Russian state-owned entities that have been sanctioned by the U.S. government, including VTB, Gazprom, Rostec and Rusnano, according to the firm's website.

The war hasn't stopped the work of Baker McKenzie's Ukrainian staffers, managing partner Chorny told Law360.

"The Kyiv office continues to accept and discharge client assignments," Chorny said, "and are also actively involved in a number of pro bono projects like the one related to the EU candidacy questionnaire."

--Editing by Jill Coffey.