EU COULD ASSUME CAUCASUS PEACEKEEPING ROLE
By Thomas de Waal in London for IWPR

ISN, Switzerland
May 31 2006

The European Union’s new special representative for the South Caucasus
sees an enhanced role for the EU in conflict resolution.

The new European Union special representative for the Caucasus, Peter
Semneby, has suggested that the EU could in future lead a peacekeeping
mission if a solution to the Nagorny Karabakh dispute is found.

Semneby, a Swedish diplomat who has just taken up the post, said in
an interview with IWPR in London last week that he wants to use his
mandate to work on the region’s unresolved conflicts.

“It’s no surprise that the main priority of my work is to engage as
far as possible with conflict resolution,” he said.

Semneby emphasized that the European Union has no formal role in the
detailed negotiations over Abkhazia – where the United Nations plays
a mediating role – and in South Ossetia and Nagorny Karabakh, where
that role is played by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation
in Europe (OSCE).

However, the idea of an international peacekeeping force is known to
be under discussion in the current Karabakh talks, and should there
be a breakthrough, an international body will be asked to lead it.

This is where the EU could step in.

“We will be expected to make a major contribution when a solution
is found, and we are looking into the possibilities we have, both in
terms of post-conflict rehabilitation and also – if the parties should
so desire – in terms of contributing peacekeepers. And possibly even
leading a peacekeeping operation,” said Semneby. “I should mention
that this is very hypothetical at this stage. This is only one of
several options, but it’s one that is being considered.”

A recent report by the International Crisis Group entitled “Conflict
Resolution in the South Caucasus: The EU’s Role” was scathing about
the low profile the European Union has adopted on conflict resolution
in the Caucasus until now.

“[The EU] does not participate directly in negotiations on Nagorny
Karabakh, Abkhazia or South Ossetia,” said the report, published in
March. “In and around Nagorny Karabakh, it has done little for conflict
resolution. It has rarely raised the South Caucasus conflicts in its
high-level discussions with partners and has employed few sanctions
or incentives to advance peace.”

A subtle change in language in the mandate assigned to Semneby,
compared with that of his predecessor Heikki Talvitie, means the EU
special representative is no longer asked to “assist the resolution
of conflicts” but to “contribute to the resolution of conflicts”.

Semneby said this linguistic change was small but important, calling it
“a political signal that the conflicts are very high on the agenda”.

The post of special representative was established in 2003 and has
a broad mandate -but a small budget. Acknowledging that it would
be impossible to “engage across the board”, Semneby identified his
major priorities as contributing to peace processes and supporting
state-building in the region, through initiatives such as judicial
reform.

Semneby, 46, has spent most of his career in Eastern Europe. As a
Swedish diplomat he visited the Armenian earthquake zone in 1988,
and he was a member of the first OSCE mission in Georgia in 1992. He
also served as the last OSCE ambassador to Latvia and more recently was
the organization’s ambassador in Croatia – another post he says gives
him the right experience to engage with the conflict-riven Caucasus.

He confessed to a feeling of “deja vu” in returning to the region
after a long gap, “This is the most disappointing aspect of coming
back to the Caucasus after so many years. Of course there have been
changes for the better as well. But the conflicts are such an obstacle
to the normal development of societies in the Caucasus.”

Semneby will be called upon to tackle the image problem the EU has
in the region, with lower visibility than the United States.

The special representative has to talk on behalf of 25 countries,
many of which have their own individual interests in the region. He
acknowledged that the failure to adopt an EU constitution, which
would have led to the development of a more coherent foreign policy,
had made his job harder.

However, with Bulgaria and Romania set to join the EU next year and
Turkey beginning membership talks, the South Caucasus will inevitably
begin to figure larger in Brussels.

Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia are all members of the EU’s European
Neighbourhood Policy, a development that Semneby said was deepening
their relationship with Brussels and would also entitle them to
increased aid. “We’re talking about hundreds of millions of euros
for each country. The EU will also step up its representation in the
countries, which will mean there will be a larger degree of visibility
in the South Caucasus.”

“I will also spend some time trying to explain to the public in the
South Caucasus what the EU is about. There is not a whole lot of
knowledge to begin with. To the extent that the EU is known, there
are still a lot of misunderstandings about what [it] is about.”

“I think there is also lack of knowledge in the EU about the south
Caucasus and its particular problems and about the importance of this
region for the EU, and if possible this is something I would like to
engage on.”

Asked about the hopes of many people in the region who dream of
joining the EU one day, the special representative was careful to
reiterate that the European Neighbourhood Policy “does not contain
a membership perspective”.

“It does mean that the countries can achieve a lot of the benefits
of EU membership by working on the implementation of the European
Neighbourhood Policy,” he went on.

“There is a problem – and I am the first to admit that – that since the
membership perspective is not there as a big carrot at the end, this
deprives us of one of the most powerful levers we had in encouraging
the countries of Central Europe to carry out painful reforms.”

This article originally appeared in Caucasus Reporting Service,
produced by the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR).

Caucasus Reporting Service is supported by the UK Foreign Office and
the US State Department.