When EU and Russian leaders meet in Stockholm for their regular summit this week it might be a useful occasion for a stock-taking exercise. This will be the last such summit for Javier Solana and Benita Ferrero-Waldner, the EU’s two top foreign policy chiefs. Next year, under the Lisbon treaty, their jobs will be merged thus giving the EU more coherence, continuity and visibility in external relations – or so it is hoped.
The Stockholm summit will take place just after Sweden and Finland have granted permission for the controversial Nordstream project to go ahead. It will also take place less than a month before the Copenhagen climate change conference. But unlike the EU, climate change is almost a non issue in Russia. Their major focus is on the economy and restoring Russia’s influence in its neighbourhood. The summit will hopefully give a push to the faltering PCA negotiations although little can be expected in the remainder of 2009. Russia is already looking to Spain, the next EU Presidency, to push the reset button.
What can the summiteers learn from the past five years and where should EU-Russia relations be heading? An obvious win-win area is economic cooperation. Russia has been hit more severely than the EU or most large countries by the global financial crisis. While China expects to grow at 8.5% this year, Russia faces a dramatic 11% drop in its growth rate.
The IMF expects only a modest recovery of 1.5% growth in 2010.
Talk of Russia relying on its own resources to shield it from the swings of global markets has faded and Vladimir Putin has embarked on a new charm offensive to win back foreign investors. Despite Mr Putin’s exhortations, there has been no rush back to the Russian market. Indeed the well publicised cases of BP, Shell, Telenor and IKEA underline how much Russia still has to do in terms of fighting corruption and establishing the rule of law. Two other major problems are the monograds – the many cities across Russia reliant on one industry – and the banking system which is increasingly under state control and clogged by bad debts.
Perhaps the strongest critic of the past years is President Medvedev who last week stated that Russia had to tackle its “ineffective economy, semi-Soviet social structure and weak democracy.” In his state of the union speech, Medvedev named five priority areas for Russia to focus on: energy efficiency technology, the nuclear sector, information technology, space and pharmaceuticals. The President reiterated his attack on huge state corporations, created by his predecessor Vladimir Putin, saying they would have to reform into commercial companies or disappear. He also ordered the government to reduce the share of the state-controlled sector, now exceeding 40 per cent, by the time of the next presidential election in 2012. But his speech did not address the key issue of what would be the driving force behind innovation.
The President has also been trenchant in his criticism of ‘legal nihilism,’ recognising that without independent courts Western investors, essential for the transformation of Russia, will remain highly cautious about further investment. There are some positive signs with the Ministry of Justice working to update the bankruptcy laws and other legislation affecting business. But Medvedev’s remarks demonstrate that what is needed is no less than a fundamental reform of the political system. It is not obvious, however, that the man in the Kremlin has sufficient support to bring about such change in the near future.
Against this background how can the EU help Russia to modernise its economy? The EU is already the top trading partner for Russia – 55% of Russian exports go to the EU – and the top investor – 65% of FDI comes from the EU. The EU has the finance, technology and know-how to help Russia modernise its increasingly outdated infrastructure, especially in the energy sector. For its part, the EU is heavily dependent on Russian energy. But as a result of recent ‘gas wars’ – and the threat of more to come – it is looking to diversify its energy supplies and speed up the introduction of renewable energy. Russia itself wastes an enormous amount of energy – it loses more gas each year than France consumes.
The EU and Russia need to consider a new deal whereby the EU offers to help modernise the Russian economy and guarantees security of demand for Russian energy. In return, Russia would ease its restrictive new laws on foreign ownership and take real steps to improve the court system. Russia should also consider recognising the importance of early membership of the WTO and drop its insistence on joining only with Belarus and Kazakhstan. This would then pave the way for a free trade agreement between the EU and Russia.
Pragmatic cooperation on the economic front could contribute to greater understanding on other issues, including the common neighbourhood and foreign policy issues such as Iran and Afghanistan. It could also be accompanied by moves to abolish visas and greatly expand educational and scientific exchanges.
It will not be easy to move from an atmosphere of suspicion to one of mutual cooperation. But both sides stand to gain from a new approach. A strong, stable, prosperous and increasingly liberal Russia is very much in the interests of the EU.
На вопросы «Времени новостей» ответил 37-летний литовский политик Мантас АДОМЕНАС, являющийся президентом Балтийской ассамблеи. Она образована для сотрудничества парламентов Литвы, Латвии и Эстонии в 1991 году, в нее входят по 20 депутатов от каждой страны.
– В сентябре прибалтийские страны обеспокоились российско-белорусскими учениями «Запад-2009». Даже жаловались генсеку НАТО Андерсу Фог Расмуссену, который в октябре посетил Литву, Латвию и Эстонию. Вы это имеете в виду, когда говорите об отсутствии комфорта?
– Часть российских военных, участвовавших в тех маневрах, осталась в Белоруссии, а это повышает наши опасения. К тому же у НАТО нет пока плана обороны стран Балтии. Я надеюсь, в новой стратегической концепции альянса этот вопрос найдет свое решение.
Интервью с директором Московского Центра Карнеги Дмитрием Трениным.
Дмитрий Тренин: Если же говорить о договоре по евробезопасности, то для России смысл всего того, что предпринимается с ее стороны, заключается в том, чтобы заблокировать движение НАТО на восток. Может это быть реализовано в рамках договора? Думаю, нет. Если договор подтвердит все те принципы, которые уже изложены в Парижской хартии для Новой Европы 1990 года, в Хельсинском заключительном акте 1975 года, в тех положениях, которые присутствуют в договорах между Россией и странами НАТО, то при дальнейшем повторении эти принципы не укрепляются, а, как правило, размываются. Я тоже здесь не вижу каких-то, если хотите, достижений. Это не критика. Это просто анализ.
Статья Владимира Милова. … Территория бывшего СССР больна вирусом несвободы так же, как и 20 лет назад. Здесь идет ожесточенная борьба за выбор модели развития. Все острые конфликты последних лет — будь то холодная война с Украиной, горячая с Грузией или полицейская война против оппозиции на улицах российских городов — передовая линия этой борьбы. Борьбы за то, где пройдет новая разделительная линия между свободой и несвободой, новая стена. Дело в этом, а вовсе не в происках Запада, которыми и 20 лет назад точно так же объясняли стремление восточных немцев попасть в Западный Берлин ….
Источник: ВедомостиИнтервью с генеральным секретарем Организации Договора о коллективной безопасности Николаем Бордюжей.
Н. Бордюжа: — ОДКБ не ищет контактов с альянсом, мы самодостаточная организация, у нас немало более насущных задач, которые требуют решения. В то же время ОДКБ готова к сотрудничеству с НАТО. Замечу, что на сегодняшнем этапе разговор о взаимодействии двух организаций начали именно на Западе, причем инициатором стал экс-советник президента США по вопросам национальной безопасности Збигнев Бжезинский. Его предложение об установлении контактов НАТО и ОДКБ на афганском направлении в противодействии прежде всего наркотрафику нашло отклик у нового руководства альянса. Отмечу, что генеральный секретарь НАТО Андрес Фог Расмуссен лично присутствовал на презентации «Канала».
It is hard to believe that only twenty years ago many Eastern European countries were cut off from Western countries and living in fear of aggressive invasion. The West also lived in fear – of Soviet tanks invading from the East, fear of a Third World War and of nuclear annihilation. Only twenty short years since Europe was torn between the capitalist West backed by the USA and socialist East with the mysterious and mighty Soviet Union lurking behind its East European satellites.
And then, all of a sudden, the whole Eastern bloc collapsed. It happened so instantly, within only a few weeks, that future historians will be surprised at how the bloc could have managed to survive for several decades after the Second World War, so unnatural seems the communist system in hindsight.
Nevertheless, nobody can boast today that they foresaw the current state of contemporary Europe and the EU all that time ago; to foresee the continent transformed to such a great extent that even to travel across it (a troublesome experience in the past) has ceased to be a problem at all. Younger Europeans can hardly imagine that their contemporary way of life would have been regarded as miraculous by their senior, post-war predecessors.
But looking back at the events of early November 1989 one could also become surprised at the naivety of most politicians of the day when they expressed their hope for a “common future of Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals”. They believed, as did many commoners, that the very fact of breaking down the Berlin Wall would create a new kind of Europe entity, based on common shared values and corresponding institutions.
Today it is difficult to figure out when exactly those hopes failed when thinking about Russia. Was it during the early years of Boris Yeltsin’s rule when democratic and pro-market reforms seemed to be faced with not only many pro-communist Russian politicians and representatives of the political establishment, but also by ‘people in the streets’ for whom democracy and market economy by themselves were not “self-evident” truths. Or did the disillusionment come hand in hand with the presidential elections of 1996, when the reelection of Yeltsin for a second term had been achieved at the cost of selling out the whole Russian economy to a small group of corrupt oligarchs? Or was a new Wall between the West and the East built because of today’s Russia, finally shaped under the rule of Vladimir Putin when it became crystal clear that contemporary Russian society was being built upon a system of values which had little or nothing in common with those of Europe. It is probably this area of contradiction where there is a marked lack of convergence which has led to the construction of this new, invisible, but no less real Wall between the West and Russia.
This wall can not be seen on the surface of the Earth. It has not been constructed of concrete, and nobody would shoot someone trying to get over it. Few people even try to look behind it, so there is no need to shoot. Not only because this wall is stronger or higher than the emblematic Berlin Wall, but because this wall is present in people’s minds. The contemporary rulers of Russia have managed to raise a population that is not only politically obedient and passive, but also that doesn’t seek alternative ways of life for themselves and their country.
In today’s Russia it is not difficult to find alternative, objective and non-official information. There is no comparison with the times when those seeking such information had to hide radio receivers as they tried to tune into The Voice of America, the BBC, or Radio Liberty. Now everyone can turn to the Internet or other independent sources of information if they are not fully satisfied with the official propaganda broadcast by TV. But the problem is that the majority of Russian people are not interested, they do not seek such information. There is no use for any sort of alternative, neither political, nor informational – and, for many, little sense in it. In other words, there is no demand for freedom and human rights, not only because these rights and freedoms are suppressed by the authorities, but mostly due to the fact that most people feel comfortable in their current miserable condition. They are not used to alternatives of any sort, they are not used to other ways of (free) living, they are not used to independent, critical thought. They live with another sort of fear – the fear of freedom. To them that freedom is more risky, more scary. It offers a more adventurous and more unpredictable way of life than that they are used to. So, they prefer stability to risk, they prefer a miserable (safe and predictable) life to oen that is rich in (unsafe and unpredictable) opportunities.
That sort of wall will be much harder to breach – even if the people were to come together to bring it down themselves.
In a poll provided by VCIOM, just before the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall pollsters asked the Russians what they knew about this historic event. The results were shocking to foreign observers. Only 24% of Russians knew that the Berlin Wall had been erected by the USSR and the GDR to prevent people from fleeing from the socialist East to the capitalist West in their thousands. 10% were certain that it had been constructed by Western Germany. 58% had no idea who took the decision to build it. In fact, only 19% of those interviewed saw the wall as a symbol of the cold war.
How many of those people can truly understand what its fall meant? And how many of those can appreciate those freedoms created by the new geopolitical situation – not only in Europe but for Russians as well. Unfortunately, only 20 years on it appears that there are few in Russia who feel that they need this freedom, that they feel comfortable to live without the wall and all that it ‘sheilded’ them from…
President Medvedev’s State of the Nation Report
According to Kremlin sources, President Medvedev will deliver his state of the nation report on 12 November to the Federal Assembly. Then the second reading of the draft budget legislation will follow one week later. And on 21 November Vladimir Putin will speak before United Russia. Given that the priority in the state of the nation report will be the modernisation of the economy, one can expect changes in the composition of the budget. Medvedev has also let it be known that he intends to take up some of the themes he outlined in his Forward Russia article, which attracted some 13,000 comments on line.
The Institute for Contemporary Development has also published a study outlining the priorities to be addressed in order to help modernise Russia. The authors doubt whether there can be a successful modernisation programme as long as the Putin elite remains in power. They believe that it does not make sense to demolish the system that Putin established but rather to set up a parallel power structure. The two structures could exist side by side for some time before the new pushes the old to one side.
Mikhail Khodorkovsky has also entered the debate with an article in Vedomosti speculating on who could lead the President’s modernisation programme. It could not be the bureaucracy and its allies in business nor the siloviki. Modernisation could not be pushed by any one leader, regardless of the strength of his position. One had to develop a coalition for modernisation from about three per cent of the working population (around two million people). This coalition could develop new professionals, especially in SMEs, from those scientists and engineers who studied in the Soviet Union in the ‘60s/‘70s and who have not given up hope of changing Russia. This coalition should also include those who left Russia in the post-Soviet period and who might be persuaded to return and make use of their talents; plus young scientists and engineers who have just completed their studies and who face a difficult decision whether to stay or leave Russia. The coalition could also draw in those members of the intelligentsia (journalists and teachers) who have not given up on a democratic future. To ensure the success of this modernisation process, there would need to be fundamental political reforms and a flourishing civil society.
Regional elections – allegations of fraud
There were regional and local elections on 11 October involving some 30 million citizens. Parties had to clear a 7% hurdle in order to gain representation. The election campaign of United Russia was aimed at securing a good result that could be viewed as support for the government in difficult times. The fact that the party was able to increase its vote by up to 33% in all three regional elections gave rise to allegations of electoral fraud. All 135 opposition MPs walked out of the Duma on 14 October in protest, with many demanding the resignation of the chair of the electoral commission.
Meanwhile the Moscow rumour mill continues to report friction between Medvedev and Putin, with some suggesting that the President will make a determined effort to bring more of his people into the administration in coming weeks.
Статья Михаила Горбачева, экс-президента СССР. “Очевидно, что модель отношений с другими европейскими странами, основанная на максимально быстром “поглощении” большинства из них в ЕС и в то же время оставляющая взаимоотношения с Россией в зыбком, неопределенном состоянии, исчерпала себя. Но, кажется, в Европе не все готовы это признать. Мы вправе задать вопрос: не связана ли эта неопределенность с нежеланием участвовать в возрождении России? Какая Россия вам нужна – сильная, действительно самостоятельная или просто поставщик ресурсов, “знающий свое место”? В Европе, к сожалению, немало политиков, которые хотели бы навязать неравную модель отношений с Россией: “учитель – ученик”, “прокурор – обвиняемый”. Россия не примет такую модель. Она хочет, чтобы ее поняли. Мы за равноправное, взаимовыгодное сотрудничество.”
Источник: Российская газетаДля России естественно быть империей, сильный лидер важнее демократического правительства, а сильная экономика важнее хорошей демократии. Таковы результаты опроса, проведенного Pew Research Center, одним из ведущих американских социологических центров. Опрос проводился в 13 странах бывшего СССР и соцлагеря и был приурочен к 20-летию падения Берлинской стены. … Наиболее оптимистичны в отношении демократии и ее ценностей в Чехии, наименее — в России и на Украине. Вообще полученные в России результаты весьма поразили социологов, поскольку столь низких величин, характеризующих отношение людей к таким важным составляющим демократии, как свобода слова, прессы или выборов, они не ожидали.
Источник: Время новостейGeneral Motors (GM) не будет продавать Opel консорциуму Magna и Сбербанка. Отказ от сделки совет директоров GM объяснил «улучшением ситуации в бизнесе GM в последние несколько месяцев и важностью Opel/Vauxhall для глобальной стратегии компании». В структуре GM Opel отвечает за разработку малолитражных автомобилей; продав Opel, американская компания лишилась бы этого ключевого сегмента рынка.
Источник: Ведомости