EC TO PROPOSE ASSOCIATION AGREEMENTS TO SIX POST-SOVIET NEIGHBORS, INCLUDING ARMENIA

PanARMENIAN.Net
25.11.2008 19:21 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The European Commission is to propose pulling the
EU’s six post-Soviet neighbors closer to the West by recognizing
their "European aspirations" and creating a new "European Economic
Area." But a draft communique indicates that EU-Russia relations have
preferential status.

"The conflict in Georgia in August 2008 and its broader repercussions
have resulted in increased awareness of the vulnerability of
Eastern partners," the draft commission communication on the Eastern
Partnership (EP) says. "There is a sense of urgency among member
states as to the need to enhance relations with our Eastern neighbors
to support them in drawing closer to the EU."

The new EU policy – first floated by Poland and Sweden in May –
proposes signing "Association Agreements" with Belarus, Moldova,
Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan in the next few years and to
"acknowledge the European identity and aspirations of these countries."

The draft communique underlines that the new pacts, which recall
the association treaties signed with Poland or Lithuania prior to
the 2004 round of enlargement, do not amount to a promise of future
accession. "The conclusion of Association Agreements will be without
prejudice to the partners’ European aspirations."

But the EP is to contain measures designed to send "a clear and lasting
political message of EU solidarity" and to "produce benefits perceived
and recognized by citizens of the partner countries."

The moves include establishing "a single deep and comprehensive Free
Trade Area, providing the basis for the development of a common
internal market, such as the European Economic Area [EEA]," which
the EU currently has with Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein.

The future EEA will require the six states to "take over the entire
acquis communautaire [the EU’s legal code], including the acceptance
of European Court of Justice rulings."

The Eastern Partnership will aim to create visa free travel in the
long-term, but to waive the cost of obtaining EU visas more quickly
and to set up Common Application Centers in the six countries to help
people enter the EU’s passport-free Schengen zone.

On the energy front, Memorandums of Understanding are to help guarantee
EU energy security, leading to "joint management, and even ownership
of pipelines by companies of supplier, transit and consumer countries."

At the institutional level, the commission is to publish the final
version of its EP communication on 3 December, in time for the French
EU presidency’s last summit on 11 December to cement the text in
its conclusions.

The draft communique proposes holding an "Eastern Partnership
Summit" in June 2009 to launch the project. Follow-up meetings of
EU and Eastern Partnership foreign ministers are to take place each
Spring. "Senior officials" from the "27 + 5 (6)" countries are to
meet twice-yearly to prepare for the ministerials.

The European Partnership is to raise the EU’s per capita spending in
the region from the current Ë~F6 per head to Ë~F12 per head by 2013
and Ë~F20 per head by 2020, compared to the current Ë~F30 per head
in the Balkans. The shift will cost Ë~F2.1 billion, atop the lost
income of Ë~F75 million per year as a result of waiving EU visa costs,
EUobserver reports.

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