Russia’s European overture

At a recent EU-Russia summit in London, amid technical discussion of visa requirements and the high politics of weaning Iran away from completing the nuclear fuel cycle, the Russian authorities quietly pushed the idea that a new framework for EU-Russian relations needed to be found.

Moscow, it seems, was testing the water for ideas about what could replace the Partnership and Co-operation Agreement (PCA) when it runs out in two years' time.

"Generally speaking, the PCA has become obsolete," Vladimir Putin's advisor on EU affairs, Sergei Yastrzhembsky, remarked. "Large-scale changes have taken place over the last ten years," he added.

So far it is not clear what Russia would like to see from relations post-2007 and EU diplomats still gripe that the PCA has not itself been fully realised. But according to some, behind this apparently bureaucratic concern lies the key to the future of EU-Russia relations.

Grigory Yavlinsky, the head of the opposition Yabloko Party and former presidential candidate, said the rise of China and the preponderance of US power put the question of EU-Russia relations at the centre of geo- strategic concerns.

In 25 years, he said, "the world will have two major economic powers": North America and South East Asia. "What about Europe? Does Europe want to be part of the triangle, or does it want to be marginalised and outside of the game?

"I think that seriously there is only one possibility, to integrate into the European economy Russian natural resources, Russian territory, Russian intellectual resources. I think if that were to happen there would be new qualities and new possibilities for the European economy," Yavlinsky added.

For Russia, he said, the stakes are even higher.

"It is the only way to become a modern country for the 21st century and not to collapse. [Russia] has the longest borders in the world with the most unstable regions of the world, so the only way to move forward is to integrate itself into modernisation."

With much of Russia's natural resources lying in its far east and recent laws rescinding the right of regional governors to be directly elected, the impact on Russia of China's rise is already an issue, according to Tanya Lokshina, chair of Demos, a Moscow-based research centre.

"If you go to the Far East, if you go to places like Vladivostok, what you see there is not Russia, that is already China and that is how the locals feel about it. They feel closer to China than the administrative centre. Moscow is so far away and for them what happens in the federal centre absolutely does not matter, all the business is Chinese all the influences are Chinese and that is crucial in itself," she said.

According to Yavlinsky, without a robust economy and democratic development Russia may implode, putting the fate of Far Eastern resources and Europe's future as a player on the international stage in doubt. "North-East Asia has huge natural resources, what is their future?" he asked, adding: "It is a very serious question."

For now he sees little response on the part of the EU.

He said: "I think Europe lost its strategy after the collapse of the Berlin Wall. The relations between Russia and the EU are good, but...Russia is not a democracy and that undermines the strategic goals. My dream is that Russia would become an equal part of Europe. That would be a really new stage of development.

"The question is how to organise that, how to move in that direction. Russia is moving in the opposite direction and the EU is looking on," Yavlinsky added.

His criticisms echo those made by former external relations commissioner Chris Patten in his most recent book Not Quite the Diplomat, where he strongly criticised Europe's inability to forge what he describes as a "sensible, principled strategy on Russia".

Like Yavlinsky, Patten - who was partly responsible for the EU's policy on Russia until he stepped down last year - concludes that the effect of the EU's "feebleness in handling Russia is as bad for Russia itself as it is for us".

Author suggests that Russia urgently needed to forge an alliance with the European Union.

European Commission: DG External Relations: Countries: Russia http://www.eeas.europa.eu/russia/index_en.htm

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