British half-year term in the EU

On the 1 st of July the EU presidency has been passed from Luxembourg to the UK. The Russian press has been keeping under scrutiny the situation that has emerged in the EU by that moment and speculating over possible steps to be made by London in the presidential capacity.

“The UK is receiving the EU in the state of crisis: the referendums on the EU Constitution in France and the Netherlands have failed; no success has been achieved on the adoption of the budget for 2007-2013. Besides, residents of the Union are scared of the prospect of Turkey’s accession” (“Vremya Novostey” newspaper, 01.07.2005). The press has frequently claimed that England itself was to blame for the internal problems of the EU: “ Britain also had its part in the European crisis, by delaying for an indefinite period its own plebiscite and sinking the EU budget.” (Ibid) “Tony Blair is responsible for the failure of the Brussels summit of June 17 th, and, consequently, for the gravest crisis of the EU” (“Vremya Novostey” newspaper, 04.07.2005).

In response to the voiced accusations, Blair said that “in reality he is a convinced advocate of the EU as a political project and is not, by far, willing to reduce it to a primitive common market.” In doing so, he has essentially cast away the labels the “Old Europe” has been putting on the Anglo-Saxon dissenters. … Said Tony Blair, “I believe in Europe with a strong and caring social dimension. I would never accept a Europe as simply an economic market” (“Vremya Novostey” newspaper, 04.07.2005). The British PM has furthermore emphasised that the Union should modernise its social model and take care to save on spending. He maintained that the EU’s did need a social model, which, however, should be feasible. It should not be a model permitting 20 million unemployed with “productivity rates falling behind those of the US” (Prime-TASS Economic Information Agency, 04.07.2005). London also considers that “it is time to abandon the experiments on creating the most powerful economy and a European-wide alms-house at the same time and focus on the economy while choosing liberalisation and deregulation as the tools” (“Vremya Novostey” newspaper, 01.07.2005).

The reaction of the European Commission to the ambitious plans of the UK was rather sceptical. “The European Commission considers that during the half-year term of the British Presidency in the EU there are virtually no chances to reach a compromise on the 2007-2013 budget problem that has been the key reason for the failure of the EU Summit on June 17 th. Dalia Grybauskaitė, the European Commissioner on budget issues, has expressed her doubts with regard to the plans by Prime-Minister Tony Blair to begin a profound economic reform of the EU. According to her, the plan is, for the time being, lacking content, while at the same time causing dissent within the Union: “Today I can only see the desire to go into action and start the talk on the reforms, but do not see the contents of those reforms. Yet, any European discussion on the reforms is a long process. If one has a task of restoring the damaged reputation inside the country by an impressive discussion of the reforms, and if that is what we would have to expect in December, I will consider it an example of irresponsible populism” (Prime-TASS Economic Information Agency, 05.07.2005).

In spite of a whole number of difficulties in the framework of the European Union as such, London promises Moscow that “over its half-year presidency the internal EU problems will not damage the organisation’s cooperation with Russia. As the UK Ambassador to Russia Tony Brenton is quoted saying, on October 4 th of the current year, the EU-Russia Summit will take place in London. Before it is convened, Britain promises to “fill with concrete content” all the gaps in the Agreement on Four Common Spaces signed at the EU-Russia summit in Moscow in May this year. The EU would like to “give a new impetus to the energy dialogue between Russia and the EU.” To do that, a meeting of the energy ministers of the EU and Russia will take place before the October Summit” (“Vremya Novostey” newspaper, 01.07.2005).

Meeting of the leaders of Russia, France and Germany

On July 3 rd, the negotiations between Vladimir Putin, Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroeder took place in a resort town of Svetlogorsk. In the course of the summit timed so as to coincide with the 750 th anniversary of Kaliningrad, the scheduled topics have been discussed: “specific format of the mechanism for the adoption and implementation of joint decisions on issues related to Kaliningrad Oblast decided upon at the November 2004 EU-Russia Summit in the Hague; prospects for the activities in the framework of G8; the principles of “multilateralism” in the approaches to specific modern problems, fighting new challenges and threats, settlement of crisis situations and regional conflicts. The topics of non-proliferation of mass destruction weapons, in the first place concerning the Iran nuclear programme, the situation in Iraq and around the Middle East conflict resolution, as well as the state of affairs in other “hot spots” have been featured in the course of the discussion” (Polit.ru, 04.07.2005).

The EU-Russia relations were one of the main subjects of the meeting. Both Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroeder maintained that “latest developments in the Union will not in any way affect the relations between the EU and Moscow. “The problems of the Constitution and EU enlargement are the problems of the EU members,” said Gerhard Schroeder. “There is a crisis, but it has nothing to do with Mr. Putin,” he added. Jacques Chirac also confirmed that the failure of the EU Constitution will not in any way affect the “strategic partnership with Russia” (“Trud” newspaper, 04.07.2005). Vladimir Putin has in turn stressed “that Moscow summit in May this year has, in fact, completed a stage, which is very important in our opinion, the one of adjustment of the “road maps” on the four common spaces between Russia and the EU. It is now necessary to test the mechanisms for the implementation of those agreements. I have informed my colleagues today on how such work is being done by us in Russia. Here, on the land of Kaliningrad, we have thoroughly discussed the prospects of the development of this region in the context of the accomplished EU enlargement. Over the past years we have been able to remove together a number of acute problems. Russia’s relations with France and Germany also have a chance to serve as an example of successful and constructive cooperation” (“Rossiyskaya Gazeta” newspaper, 04.07.2005).

At the press conference following the negotiations with the leaders of France and Germany the RF president remarked that “he is counting on the fruitful cooperation with those countries during the next year, when the chairmanship in G8 would pass over to Russia. Further to that, Vladimir Putin stated that Russia proposes energy safety as one of the priority topics for its chairmanship in G8 in 2006: “I have no doubt that the experience accumulated in the framework of the EU-Russia energy dialogue will be used to prepare the events on that topic,” Russian President added (RIA Novosti, 04.07.2005).

Visit to Finland by Russian President

In early August Vladimir Putin conducted negotiations with Tarja Halonen, President of Finland. Both leaders were contained with the spirit of the meeting that took place and the range of problems discussed. Ms. Halonen stated that “excellent relations have been established between Russia and Finland. We have had quite lengthy and extensive conversations and discussed various multiple questions.” (ParlComm Centre for Parliamentary Communications, 03.08.2005) Mr. Putin has also stressed that he is content with the “nature and development of the relations between Finland and Russia over the past years. Their level is high. That has to do both with the political interaction and economic ties. (Ibid)

One of the main subjects of negotiations was the status of Russian-speaking citizens in the Baltic countries. Tarja Halonen stated that “the issue will not be among the priorities during the Finnish EU Presidency in the second half of 2006. It does not mean, however, that it will not be among the priorities because it is of no interest to us; it is because, I think, the respective set of issues will be settled by that time and resolved on a working level. … I have strongly supported the accession of the Baltic countries to the EU and worked a lot on making them comply with the EU requirements. Human rights, democracy and the rule of law are deeply respected in the EU. The EU works in close cooperation with OSCE and the Council of Europe, in which Russia will hold chairmanship at the same time with the Finnish Presidency in the EU. According to my information, Council of Europe and OSCE have come to a conclusion that Estonia and Latvia meet the legislative requirements they have established.” (“Izvestia” newspaper, 03.08.2005)

In response, Vladimir Putin stated that Moscow insists on finding the solution for the problems of Russian-speaking population in the Baltic countries: “We would very much like those issues to be solved not in an exclusive manner, but on common grounds. The modern legal system has developed unified approaches; there exist fundamental notions of a citizen, alien, stateless person (person without citizenship) and person of dual citizenship, while our partners in the Baltic countries have invented a new one, “non-citizen”. There is no such notion.” (“Izvestia” newspaper, 03.08.2005) The Russian President further stressed “some documents even go as far as referring to them as “strangers”. We consider it absolutely unacceptable and not meeting the contemporary requirements including the ones used in the framework of the European Union” (ParlComm Centre for Parliamentary Communications, 03.08.2005). Further to that, the head of Russian state called upon the settlement of the problem “in a normal friendly mode” since in adverse case, “only harm can be done.” “We will calmly and on a steady basis work with our European partners, including Finland,” Vladimir Putin has reassured (Izvestiya newspaper, 03.08.2005).

The situation within the Union and Finland’s plans for the forthcoming EU Presidency has also been touched upon in the course of negotiations. Tarja Halonen stated that “during the EU Presidency in the second half of 2006 her country intends to pay priority attention to the renewal of the contractual basis of the relations between Russia and the EU.” (Gazeta.ru, 02.08.2005). At the same time, she called upon not dramatising the situation that ensued in the European Union after the rejection of the EU Constitution by several countries: “We thought in the past that the Constitutional Treaty would have been enacted during the Finnish Presidency in the EU. Nonetheless, now we have been forced to take a break for reflection and think how we can move further along the same direction. Of course, we should remember that the proposed Constitutional Treaty already contains many of the provisions from the previous EU Treaties. They are merely positioned in a different sequence, in many cases. That is why life goes on as usual even without the adoption of the Constitutional Treaty. … We will keep on working on the promotion of the Constitutional Treaty, but other issues will be also important for our Presidency, including taking a decision on the EU budget framework. We hope that those decisions will be taken even prior to our presidency, and we will be able to focus on the other issues: Northern Dimension, relations between the EU and Russia, including the contractual base thereof and their organisation, taking into account that the term of the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement between the European Union and Russia is running out. Those will be the priority issues during our presidency” (ParlComm Centre for Parliamentary Communication, 03.08.2005).

Vladimir Putin was gratified with the fact that “Ms. President found it possible to make a statement that the relations between Russia and the EU will be one of the priorities during the Finnish chairmanship in the European Union. We still have may unresolved issues. However, relying on our good neighbourly relations including the ones with Finland, I believe that we will be able to solve many of them, and more over, seek such solutions that would comply with the interests of the both the entire European family and Russian Federation” (ParlComm Centre for Parliamentary Communications, 03.08.2005).