#10
Moscow News
Decemeber 11-17, 2002
Keeping Russia Outside the Fold
An expanded European Union offers Russia nothing but cold politeness
By Vladimir Lukin [former Russian ambassador to the U.S.]

The European Convention has been in session in Brussels for the ninth month now. This consultative body comprises representatives of the European Union's incumbent and prospective members, and its job is to work out specific proposals on key issues concerning the EU's future constitution.

To my mind, the importance of the Convention is underestimated by our diplomats and by our leadership as a whole.

The Convention is called upon to formulate the "rules of the game" for an expanding Europe. It must also answer a question of paramount importance: What are the final limits that a Greater Europe must not cross? The answer to this question involves, among other things, long-term Russia-EU relations.

The draft of the future European constitution excludes Russia - the continent's largest nation - from the European unification process. We consider participation in this process to be of utmost importance to us, and regret that Russian representatives have not been invited to the European Convention even as observers.

The EU of the future will comprise not 15 to 25, but 30 to 35 member states, encompassing the majority of European nations. The exceptions will probably be some East European states that are now CIS members. The possibility of admitting Russia to the EU has not even been discussed. In the apparent scenario (which Brussels is constantly disowning), there are new discriminatory barriers against Russia, based on economic as well as civilizational principles.

Russia emphatically opposes a repartition of Europe. We see the absence of Russian representatives on the European Convention as part of a highly negative tendency that manifests itself in the EU leadership's activities with discouraging regularity.

This tendency has led to outwardly benevolent - but essentially meaningless - declarations about the EU's desire "to expand and deepen cooperation" with Russia, to the extent of establishing a "Greater Europe" that would include the EU and Russia. There has been much talk about this goal, but any practical move toward it comes up against fierce resistance. So much so that one cannot help wondering: Aren't those Russians right who warn that the European Union, while endeavoring to become a global center of political and economic power, is secretly preparing to fence itself against those new states that have emerged on the territory of the former USSR (with the exception of the Baltic states)? Evidently, after the upcoming expansion becomes reality, the EU will put up impenetrable barriers on its new frontiers. The motive of this shortsighted policy is this: Russia, staying behind the fence we have erected around our fold, must protect us against all dangerous winds blowing from! the east and southeast.

Russia is not particularly heartened by a scenario in which it provides energy resources and security guarantees for Europe in exchange for cordial words that do not imply real participation in all-European affairs.

This attitude of the EU toward Russia is also confirmed by official EU documents that present Brussels' views on the pattern and scale of cooperation with Russia in the foreseeable future: While exaggerating the urgency of mostly tactical tasks, they fail to look at Europe's largest power in a broader context of strategy.

One point to remember is that all previous attempts to alienate Russia from Europe merely undermined European security. Russia sees integration into Europe as a top priority, but it won't endeavor to secure the goodwill of its EU partners to the detriment of its own interests, especially as Russia and the EU have a vested interest in each other at present that has never been so great.

The EU should reciprocate by getting down to jointly fostering mutually beneficial relationships in all areas of socio-economic and political life. Instead, it has once again "forgotten" to invite Russia to come and discuss Europe's future. What Russia is offered is not real partnership, but purely token proposals of maintaining relations of "mutual respect" that actually mean no more than reserved politeness.

Russian poet and philosopher Dmitry Merezhkovsky (whose final resting place is in Paris, the EU's very heart) said that the status of Russians in Europe in some ways resembles the status of Jews there. The Russian community in Europe has the status of a ghetto. A ghetto always presents danger - to itself as well as to those living around it.

The EU wants to build "an all-European club of civilized nations" using Russian resources and concessions; but it bars Russia from participating in European processes. At best, such an "association" would be defective from the viewpoint of political strategy; at worst, it would result in expanded Europe creating with its own hands an irremovable destabilizing factor in the shape of Russia.

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