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Despite Delaying Its Membership Bid, EU Is Piggybacking On Turkey's

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  • Despite Delaying Its Membership Bid, EU Is Piggybacking On Turkey's

    DESPITE DELAYING ITS MEMBERSHIP BID, EU IS PIGGYBACKING ON TURKEY'S INFLUENCE IN CAUCASUS

    PanARMENIAN.Net
    01.05.2009 14:59 GMT+04:00

    /PanARMENIAN.Net/ Under pressure from Brussels, Europe's 'wild east'
    is coming in from the cold - but plenty of obstacles still remain

    The EU's invitation to Belarus to attend a special summit in Prague
    next week is the latest sign a spring thaw may be taking hold along
    the ragged, fraught frontiers of Europe's "wild east". The so-called
    frozen conflicts that have disfigured the region since the end of
    the cold war are beginning to melt at the edges. Under pressure from
    Brussels, the ice is starting to shift.

    Most significant in strategic and economic terms is the burgeoning
    rapprochement between Turkey and Armenia, which last week unveiled
    a joint road map to normalise relations after almost a century of
    hostility. The plan includes re-opening the border closed by Turkey
    in 1993 in protest at Armenian support for separatists contesting
    Azerbaijan's control of the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh.

    Despite effectively placing its membership bid on hold, the EU is happy
    to piggyback on Turkey's considerable influence in the Caucasus and
    the Black Sea and Caspian Sea regions for its own purposes. These
    include the advancing of common trade, development, security and
    human rights agendas and most importantly, perhaps, the securing of
    non-Russian controlled energy supply routes from central Asia.

    The kiss-and-make-up scenario now developing between Ankara and Yerevan
    has thus been warmly welcomed in Brussels, and in the US. Prospectively
    it makes it easier to draw relatively isolated Armenia, which has
    long lived in Moscow's shadow, closer towards the western fold. And
    that in turn dovetails nicely with developing western ties other
    post-Soviet republics such as Georgia and Ukraine.

    A parallel thaw is underway between Armenia and Azerbaijan, which have
    begun talks on de-icing Nagorno-Karabakh. Oil-producing Azerbaijan,
    on the shores of the Caspian, is a crucial player in terms of future
    European energy supply and transit. It pays to keep it happy. Once
    again the EU, along with Turkey, has been active in promoting the
    nascent peace process. And the EU's Prague summit will host the next
    encounter of the two countries' presidents, The Guardian reported.
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