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Baltic News Service
January 17, 2008 Thursday 11:57 PM EET
ESTONIAN MEPS WORRIED ABOUT SOUTHERN CAUCASIA
TALLINN Jan 17
Estonian members of the European Parliament on Wednesday expressed
concern about the situation in Southern Caucasia.
Tunne Kelam, taking the floor on behalf of the EPP-ED faction in a
discussion over cooperation with Southern Caucasia and the Black Sea
area, appealed to the European Union to take much clearer obligations
than earlier concerning the Southern Caucasian region.
"It is our challenge to take the role of a reliable
stability-creating agent as well as of an independent mediator,"
Kelam said during the discussion last night. "To do it it is
necessary to shed hesitations and indefiniteness and to shape a
policy of the European Union with a clearer profile in the region in
question."
Kelam said the European Union's active dedication to Southern
Caucasia, planned as a long-term venture, could help find a solution
to the so-called frozen conflicts, which the parliament's foreign
affairs committee has decided to refer to by a conbsiderably more
realistic term, unsolved post-Soviet conflicts.
"It is therefore important that our report rejects any foreign
country's attempts to create exclusive zones of interest in the given
area," the speaker said. "We are appealing to Russia not to obstruct
participation of the European Union in the regulation of conflicts
and peace keeping operations in Southern Caucasia."
Kelam found that the European Union has an important role in
promoting a democratic dialogue culture in countries of the area.
"Members of the European Parliament can mediate and encourage normal
political communication between opposing parties who much too often
speak with each other only by street demonstrations," he said.
Besides, Kelam encouraged the European Commission to make
preparations to the signing of free trade agreements with Georgia and
Armenia.
Siiri Oviir, member of the parliamentary cooperation committee
between the European Union and Armenia, Azerbiajan and Georgia,
underlined that the three South Caucasian countries need the European
Union's substantial and targeted aid in the implementation of
democratic reforms.
She said one of the aims of the European Union must be to support and
encourage the development of the three countries into open, peaceful
and stable states without ignoring their peculiarities.
"They all have the same background, they all have struggled out from
under the influence of Soviet-style ideology," said Oviir, "but they
have not yet fully gotten free from the presence of the armed forces
of Russia, the legal successor of the Soviet Union."
Oviir appealed to the European Commission and the European parliament
to take more advantage of the knowhow of their former peers and
today's EU members as they are familiar with the local circumstances
and problems and have the experience of building up law-governed
states and market economies.
Oviir drew the parliament's attention to the circumstance that
democracy was not some kind of thing, but a frame of mind and it
could not be just lifted from one day to another or from one country
to another.
"Perfect democracy is not born overnight," she said.
Toomas Savi focused on Georgia's problems. He said that despite
violations discovered in the presidential elections it was absolutely
irresponsible to give grounds to make the situation in the country
tenser that it already was.
"It is dangerous to undermine legitimacy of the electoral results in
the eyes of the people, creating a suspicion that the elections were
not fair and just," Savi said.
He expressed the opinion that the politicians of those Georgia's
neighboring countries and EU members countries who had decided to
remain sceptical and at the same time voluble, had not acted in the
interests of Georgia's sustainable development and consolidation of
democracy.
Savi drew the European parliament's attention to the circumstance
that according to information of the international observation
mission, the presidential elections in Georgia corresponded by their
substance to international standards concerning democratic elections.
But she admitted that considerable failures were discovered and it
was necessary to deal with them urgently.
January 17, 2008 Thursday 11:57 PM EET
ESTONIAN MEPS WORRIED ABOUT SOUTHERN CAUCASIA
TALLINN Jan 17
Estonian members of the European Parliament on Wednesday expressed
concern about the situation in Southern Caucasia.
Tunne Kelam, taking the floor on behalf of the EPP-ED faction in a
discussion over cooperation with Southern Caucasia and the Black Sea
area, appealed to the European Union to take much clearer obligations
than earlier concerning the Southern Caucasian region.
"It is our challenge to take the role of a reliable
stability-creating agent as well as of an independent mediator,"
Kelam said during the discussion last night. "To do it it is
necessary to shed hesitations and indefiniteness and to shape a
policy of the European Union with a clearer profile in the region in
question."
Kelam said the European Union's active dedication to Southern
Caucasia, planned as a long-term venture, could help find a solution
to the so-called frozen conflicts, which the parliament's foreign
affairs committee has decided to refer to by a conbsiderably more
realistic term, unsolved post-Soviet conflicts.
"It is therefore important that our report rejects any foreign
country's attempts to create exclusive zones of interest in the given
area," the speaker said. "We are appealing to Russia not to obstruct
participation of the European Union in the regulation of conflicts
and peace keeping operations in Southern Caucasia."
Kelam found that the European Union has an important role in
promoting a democratic dialogue culture in countries of the area.
"Members of the European Parliament can mediate and encourage normal
political communication between opposing parties who much too often
speak with each other only by street demonstrations," he said.
Besides, Kelam encouraged the European Commission to make
preparations to the signing of free trade agreements with Georgia and
Armenia.
Siiri Oviir, member of the parliamentary cooperation committee
between the European Union and Armenia, Azerbiajan and Georgia,
underlined that the three South Caucasian countries need the European
Union's substantial and targeted aid in the implementation of
democratic reforms.
She said one of the aims of the European Union must be to support and
encourage the development of the three countries into open, peaceful
and stable states without ignoring their peculiarities.
"They all have the same background, they all have struggled out from
under the influence of Soviet-style ideology," said Oviir, "but they
have not yet fully gotten free from the presence of the armed forces
of Russia, the legal successor of the Soviet Union."
Oviir appealed to the European Commission and the European parliament
to take more advantage of the knowhow of their former peers and
today's EU members as they are familiar with the local circumstances
and problems and have the experience of building up law-governed
states and market economies.
Oviir drew the parliament's attention to the circumstance that
democracy was not some kind of thing, but a frame of mind and it
could not be just lifted from one day to another or from one country
to another.
"Perfect democracy is not born overnight," she said.
Toomas Savi focused on Georgia's problems. He said that despite
violations discovered in the presidential elections it was absolutely
irresponsible to give grounds to make the situation in the country
tenser that it already was.
"It is dangerous to undermine legitimacy of the electoral results in
the eyes of the people, creating a suspicion that the elections were
not fair and just," Savi said.
He expressed the opinion that the politicians of those Georgia's
neighboring countries and EU members countries who had decided to
remain sceptical and at the same time voluble, had not acted in the
interests of Georgia's sustainable development and consolidation of
democracy.
Savi drew the European parliament's attention to the circumstance
that according to information of the international observation
mission, the presidential elections in Georgia corresponded by their
substance to international standards concerning democratic elections.
But she admitted that considerable failures were discovered and it
was necessary to deal with them urgently.