September 13, 2011

This September, Poland will host the Eastern Partnership countries' summit. Considering that at the moment Warsaw holds the rotating EU presidency, the forum presents it with a serious opportunity to breath new life into the integration project for the six post-Soviet republics – Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. The Eastern Partnership, a project Poland, supported by Sweden, floated in 2008 with the stated objective of advancing strategic cooperation with the above countries, largely lacked realism from the outset, its main weakness being that its authors underestimated Russia's sway over the post-Soviet space. For the FSU republics, the EU hardly means more than a welcome trade partner, while the Eastern Partnership offered them to undividedly adopt the European development model and its implications. Predictably, the idea proved impractical. It should be taken into account as well that the area which the European Partnership is supposed to embrace is fairly heterogeneous. For example, the GDP of Ukraine, the biggest republic involved, is stuck at a level five times below the EU average. Azerbaijan and Belarus, the two top-successful economies among those invited to the Eastern Partnership, in many other regards tend to ignore the European standards. Besides, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan are parts of the Caucasus, whereas Moldova, Belarus, and Ukraine belong to East Europe.

No doubt, Poland is keenly interested in spinning off the project. Its ideal must be a political, military, and, in part, economic integration in the Eastern Partnership framework along with further detachment of the participating republics from Russia. With the post-Soviet integration stagnating for years, Warsaw hopes to outpace Moscow and seize the leadership in dealing with the six republics. The plan, however, runs into several major roadblocks. First, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia are by all means peripheral to Poland's foreign-policy agenda. Tbilisi, for example, drew Warsaw's attention only with the advent of president M. Saakashvili, a US protégé for whom Poland therefore had to express support. At the moment, the Polish diplomacy has no resources to maintain appreciable presence across Transcaucasia: while Georgia as a republic deemed important in Washington more or less stays in the spotlight, Warsaw's interest in Azerbaijan and Armenia mostly exists on paper.

In contrast, Warsaw has a vested interest in Poland's eastern neighbors – Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova. The relations between Poland and Belarus are chronically at a low point as Mensk stiffly resists Warsaw's attempts to spread its influence over Belarus with the help of the local Polish minority. In Moldova, the horizon seems completely cloudless for Poland: the Moldovan ruling Alliance for European Integration is eager to give Warsaw a role in the settlement in Transnistria and generally expects the Polish backing whenever it knocks on Europe's doors. On March 1, 2010, Moldovan premier V. Filat said at a South-East European episcopal conference that the Roman Catholic Church should be giving Moldova crucial assistance in its march to Europe. Rather surprisingly for a republic where Roman Catholics number around 20,000, or 0.1% of the total population, he even invited the Roman Catholic Church to take part in the upbringing of Moldova's people. Both Vatican and Warsaw readily prop up the pro-Romanian Moldovan administration with its quest for integration into Europe (which necessarily means integration into NATO).

Ukraine holds the greatest attraction for the proponents of the Eastern Partnership… The Ukrainian EU aspirations are sure to be discussed during the September summit. Locked in a dispute with Russia, Kyiv would clearly appreciate Poland's support. The visit Ukrainian president V. Yanukovych recently paid to Poland was evidently synchronized with Kyiv's difficult dialog with Moscow. Ukraine has rejected the very idea of joining the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, an alliance currently eyed by Vietnam, New Zealand, and Syria, is strengthening ties with NATO, and brushes off any alternatives to the integration into the EU, thus helping to break a gap in the Eurasian security architecture in the proximity of the borders of Russia and Belarus.

It is an open secret that under the current circumstances Kyiv needs a powerful partner whose encouragement could boost Ukraine's confidence vis-a-vis Moscow. From this perspective, Poland may look like an ideal candidate. It is worth noting that Warsaw manages to criticize Russia over its relations with Ukraine with a great deal of subtlety, without overstepping the limits past which Poland's own relations with Moscow would be put in jeopardy. In addition to politics, V. Yanukovych and B. Komorovsky talked about the economic transactions between their respective countries. The economic aspect of the situation should not be overlooked. Poland's eastern neighbors altogether comprise the poorest region in Europe, and an offer of preferential terms of economic cooperation would be an irresistible lure to the Eastern Partnership countries, especially Ukraine, and would surely further orient them towards the West. If the relations between Warsaw and Kyiv morph into a strategic partnership, the key mission of the Eastern Partnership would thereby be accomplished.

Yanukovych's meeting with Komorovsky was the first encounter with a foreign peer since the arrest of the former Ukrainian premier Yu. Tymoshenko, whose destiny was a recurrent theme during the talks. It would be an overstatement that Poland is preoccupied with the Tymoshenko case: though Warsaw is indeed more comfortable to see several rivals of comparable weight in the Ukrainian politics, it will hardly put Kyiv under serious pressure now that Ukraine is wrestling with Moscow and begging for patronage. Komorovsky's public stance is that the arrest of Tymoshenko puts obstacles in the way of Ukraine's Eurointegration, but thus Warsaw is simply trying to facilitate Kyiv's drift from Moscow to the EU. Quite a few of the EU countries are known to oppose the admission of Ukraine, and Warsaw is trying to neutralize their arguments when it asks Yanukovych to soften the treatment of Tymoshenko. Confronted with overwhelming criticism in Europe, Kyiv can suffer a bitter disappointment and even return to the Kremlin's orbit, which, for Poland, would mean a gross defeat.

The timing of Yanukovych's Polish tour was explainable. Combined with D. Tusk's pragmatic policies including the taming of the anti-Russian rhetoric, the EU presidency which started in July, 2011 gave Poland considerable clout. It is a widely held belief in Kyiv that Poland is the country which will open up to Ukraine an opportunity to sneak into the EU. At least, friendship with Poland is Ukraine's chance to avoid isolation despite the abnormality of its relations with Moscow and Mensk, its two closest neighbors. Note that president of the European Parliament Jerzy Buzek already expressed Poland's hope that the work on the European Union Association Agreement between Brussels and Kyiv would reach completion during the Polish presidency in the EU.

The views of individual contributors do not necessarily represent those of the Strategic Culture Foundation.

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Reanimating the Eastern Partnership

This September, Poland will host the Eastern Partnership countries' summit. Considering that at the moment Warsaw holds the rotating EU presidency, the forum presents it with a serious opportunity to breath new life into the integration project for the six post-Soviet republics – Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. The Eastern Partnership, a project Poland, supported by Sweden, floated in 2008 with the stated objective of advancing strategic cooperation with the above countries, largely lacked realism from the outset, its main weakness being that its authors underestimated Russia's sway over the post-Soviet space. For the FSU republics, the EU hardly means more than a welcome trade partner, while the Eastern Partnership offered them to undividedly adopt the European development model and its implications. Predictably, the idea proved impractical. It should be taken into account as well that the area which the European Partnership is supposed to embrace is fairly heterogeneous. For example, the GDP of Ukraine, the biggest republic involved, is stuck at a level five times below the EU average. Azerbaijan and Belarus, the two top-successful economies among those invited to the Eastern Partnership, in many other regards tend to ignore the European standards. Besides, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan are parts of the Caucasus, whereas Moldova, Belarus, and Ukraine belong to East Europe.

No doubt, Poland is keenly interested in spinning off the project. Its ideal must be a political, military, and, in part, economic integration in the Eastern Partnership framework along with further detachment of the participating republics from Russia. With the post-Soviet integration stagnating for years, Warsaw hopes to outpace Moscow and seize the leadership in dealing with the six republics. The plan, however, runs into several major roadblocks. First, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia are by all means peripheral to Poland's foreign-policy agenda. Tbilisi, for example, drew Warsaw's attention only with the advent of president M. Saakashvili, a US protégé for whom Poland therefore had to express support. At the moment, the Polish diplomacy has no resources to maintain appreciable presence across Transcaucasia: while Georgia as a republic deemed important in Washington more or less stays in the spotlight, Warsaw's interest in Azerbaijan and Armenia mostly exists on paper.

In contrast, Warsaw has a vested interest in Poland's eastern neighbors – Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova. The relations between Poland and Belarus are chronically at a low point as Mensk stiffly resists Warsaw's attempts to spread its influence over Belarus with the help of the local Polish minority. In Moldova, the horizon seems completely cloudless for Poland: the Moldovan ruling Alliance for European Integration is eager to give Warsaw a role in the settlement in Transnistria and generally expects the Polish backing whenever it knocks on Europe's doors. On March 1, 2010, Moldovan premier V. Filat said at a South-East European episcopal conference that the Roman Catholic Church should be giving Moldova crucial assistance in its march to Europe. Rather surprisingly for a republic where Roman Catholics number around 20,000, or 0.1% of the total population, he even invited the Roman Catholic Church to take part in the upbringing of Moldova's people. Both Vatican and Warsaw readily prop up the pro-Romanian Moldovan administration with its quest for integration into Europe (which necessarily means integration into NATO).

Ukraine holds the greatest attraction for the proponents of the Eastern Partnership… The Ukrainian EU aspirations are sure to be discussed during the September summit. Locked in a dispute with Russia, Kyiv would clearly appreciate Poland's support. The visit Ukrainian president V. Yanukovych recently paid to Poland was evidently synchronized with Kyiv's difficult dialog with Moscow. Ukraine has rejected the very idea of joining the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, an alliance currently eyed by Vietnam, New Zealand, and Syria, is strengthening ties with NATO, and brushes off any alternatives to the integration into the EU, thus helping to break a gap in the Eurasian security architecture in the proximity of the borders of Russia and Belarus.

It is an open secret that under the current circumstances Kyiv needs a powerful partner whose encouragement could boost Ukraine's confidence vis-a-vis Moscow. From this perspective, Poland may look like an ideal candidate. It is worth noting that Warsaw manages to criticize Russia over its relations with Ukraine with a great deal of subtlety, without overstepping the limits past which Poland's own relations with Moscow would be put in jeopardy. In addition to politics, V. Yanukovych and B. Komorovsky talked about the economic transactions between their respective countries. The economic aspect of the situation should not be overlooked. Poland's eastern neighbors altogether comprise the poorest region in Europe, and an offer of preferential terms of economic cooperation would be an irresistible lure to the Eastern Partnership countries, especially Ukraine, and would surely further orient them towards the West. If the relations between Warsaw and Kyiv morph into a strategic partnership, the key mission of the Eastern Partnership would thereby be accomplished.

Yanukovych's meeting with Komorovsky was the first encounter with a foreign peer since the arrest of the former Ukrainian premier Yu. Tymoshenko, whose destiny was a recurrent theme during the talks. It would be an overstatement that Poland is preoccupied with the Tymoshenko case: though Warsaw is indeed more comfortable to see several rivals of comparable weight in the Ukrainian politics, it will hardly put Kyiv under serious pressure now that Ukraine is wrestling with Moscow and begging for patronage. Komorovsky's public stance is that the arrest of Tymoshenko puts obstacles in the way of Ukraine's Eurointegration, but thus Warsaw is simply trying to facilitate Kyiv's drift from Moscow to the EU. Quite a few of the EU countries are known to oppose the admission of Ukraine, and Warsaw is trying to neutralize their arguments when it asks Yanukovych to soften the treatment of Tymoshenko. Confronted with overwhelming criticism in Europe, Kyiv can suffer a bitter disappointment and even return to the Kremlin's orbit, which, for Poland, would mean a gross defeat.

The timing of Yanukovych's Polish tour was explainable. Combined with D. Tusk's pragmatic policies including the taming of the anti-Russian rhetoric, the EU presidency which started in July, 2011 gave Poland considerable clout. It is a widely held belief in Kyiv that Poland is the country which will open up to Ukraine an opportunity to sneak into the EU. At least, friendship with Poland is Ukraine's chance to avoid isolation despite the abnormality of its relations with Moscow and Mensk, its two closest neighbors. Note that president of the European Parliament Jerzy Buzek already expressed Poland's hope that the work on the European Union Association Agreement between Brussels and Kyiv would reach completion during the Polish presidency in the EU.