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EU-Russia To Start Talks On New PCA

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  • EU-Russia To Start Talks On New PCA

    EU-RUSSIA TO START TALKS ON NEW PCA
    Yury Borko

    RIA Novosti
    June 30 2008
    Russia

    Russia and the European Union (EU) will start talks on a new
    Partnership and Cooperation Agreement in Brussels on July 4. This has
    become possible owing to the joint efforts undertaken under the 1994
    PCA, which expired last year. The summit in Khanty-Mansiisk kicked
    off negotiations on a new agreement.

    The decision has been made, but the course and outcome of the talks
    are more difficult to predict. EU Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner,
    who took part in the summit, believes that the talks will be long and
    difficult. To use popular sports jargon, the talks will be similar
    to steeplechase without any definite distance, start, or finish.

    Neither partner has an adequate alternative to a new agreement. Both
    equally need a legal document that will reflect the tremendous
    political and economic changes in Russia, the EU, and the
    world. Success, however, will depend on political will and a readiness
    to compromise, and so far neither side has been prepared to meet the
    other halfway. Possibly the official statement on the start of the
    talks signals a readiness to do so. At any rate, it is a good sign
    that the first round of the talks will start on July 4, just a week
    after the summit.

    Apparently the Europeans have accepted the Russian president's proposal
    for a lightly detailed framework document, leaving room for individual
    areas of cooperation to be specified in subsequent agreements.

    Some of these areas have already been mentioned in Moscow and Brussels,
    for instance energy cooperation, science and technology, trade and
    investment (after Russia's WTO entry), and visa-free travel. Some
    specific agreements may be drafted alongside the basic document,
    but on the whole a package of such agreements is expect to be the
    next stage in the formation of a new political and legal foundation
    for a Russia-EU strategic partnership.

    Three particularly contentious issues are likely to complicate the
    talks. First, in the last few years EU countries and their institutions
    have become increasingly concerned by elements of Russia's domestic
    policy that they see as contrary to the PCA's basic values. Opposition
    parties and human rights groups in Russia have a similar view of
    their government's actions. The Russian delegation's position on this
    is likely to be based on an approach recently formulated by Foreign
    Minister Sergei Lavrov, who said that Russia has embarked on radical
    peaceful reforms and will develop universal democratic values but
    in its own way, with due respect for its centuries-long traditions
    rather than under outside pressure.

    Both Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his predecessor Vladimir
    Putin support an open and public dialogue between Russia and the EU
    on these problems. However, Moscow does not want its cooperation with
    the EU to depend on the latter's assessment of the complicated and
    sometimes contradictory development of civil society and democratic
    institutions in Russia.

    The second point of tension concerns the formation of a common energy
    market, and provision of equal energy security guarantees in Europe. At
    the moment Brussels and Moscow's respective energy strategies are
    mutually exclusive. This situation is further aggravated by a lack of
    consensus within the EU itself. Many EU countries, including Germany,
    France, and Italy, oppose the strategy suggested by the European
    Commission. The author of this article is not an expert on energy,
    but it seems sensible to seal in the new agreement an equal right of
    producers and consumers to diversify their gas and oil exports, and
    transit routes. This would promote a rapprochement of the European
    and Russian positions.

    The third clash of interests will come over the CIS countries
    in Eastern Europe and the Southern Caucasus. In effect, the EU
    and Russia are competing for economic and political influence in
    these regions. If that were not enough, they are also divided on the
    domestic situation in Ukraine, Belarus, and Georgia, and hold deeply
    opposing views on the best ways of settling the "frozen conflicts"
    in Transdnestr in Moldova, Abkhazia and South Ossetia in Georgia,
    and Nagorny Karabakh between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

    Participants in the summit have agreed to preserve the current
    format of settlement for the "frozen conflicts." That is reason for
    optimism. On the whole, the summit in Khanty-Mansiisk seems to have
    been the most fruitful Russia-EU meeting in the last three years. The
    first round of the talks in Brussels will confirm or disprove this
    assessment.

    From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
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