New Coalition - New German Foreign Policy Goals

At Reuters I have came across a fresh excerpt of the new German foreign policy guidelines. German coalition negotiations between Merkel`s conservatives and the Free Democrats resulted in a foreign policy agreement as part of a wider coalition negotiation process. As a stronghold of the Euro-Atlantic alliance and the engine of Europe`s economy, Germany`s new foreign policy goals containing vital issues as NATO, Afghanistan and Russia is of key imporatnce.

Foreign policy section of German coalition draft

10.21.09, 03:02 PM EDT

BERLIN, Oct 21 (Reuters) - Below are excerpts from the foreign policy section of a draft coalition agreement that is expected to be approved by Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives and the Free Democrats (FDP) later this week.
Unless otherwise stated, this language has been agreed by working groups which include members from all the coalition parties and is therefore unlikely to be altered in the final policy programme.

TURKEY
'Germany has a special interest in deepening its relations with Turkey and linking the country to the European Union. The EU membership talks that began in 2005 are an open-ended process that is not based on automatism and has no guaranteed end-result.
'If the EU is not in a position to take on new members or Turkey cannot fully meet all the criteria necessary for membership, Turkey must be bound closely to European structures in a way that allows its privileged relationship with the EU to develop further.'

RUSSIA
'We will support Russia in its efforts to move ahead decisively with a modernisation of the country and thereby remove deficits in human rights, the rule of law and democracy.'
'The valid interests of our neighbours will be taken into account in shaping our bilateral relations with Russia.'

AFGHANISTAN
'We understand our engagement in Afghanistan as being of special national interest ... The government will continue to make a contribution to this task that is in line with its importance.'
'In cooperation with our partners, we will hand over responsibility step by step to the authorities of the country.'

IRAN
'We will continue to work, together with our partners in the E3+3 group, to ensure that Iran does not obtain nuclear weapons. In this process we favour diplomacy, but are also ready, in consultation with our partners, to pursue tougher sanctions if necessary.'

MILITARY PROJECTS
'The coalition is fully committed to the contract for the A400M military project. The strategic air transport will be secured. As for the outstanding Eurofighters, the coalition parties have agreed that future exports can count towards the number of planes that still have to be ordered in tranche 3B.'
(In brackets, indicating this has not been agreed by Merkel's conservatives, the FDP have written in: 'The government demands an immediate and amicable end to the MEADS defence project')

UNITED NATIONS REFORM
'We want the structures of this world organisation to mirror the reality of today. Against this backdrop, we remain ready to take on greater international responsibility with a permanent seat on the Security Council. Nevertheless, we continue to seek a common European permanent seat in the Security Council in the context of a broader reform and in line with the Lisbon treaty.'

DISARMAMENT
'... we will strive within (NATO) and with our American allies for a withdrawal of the last U.S. nuclear weapons from Germany.'

(Reporting by Gernot Heller; Writing by Noah Barkin; editing by David Stamp) Keywords: GERMANY COALITION/FOREIGN
(noah.barkin@reuters.com; +49 30 2888 5091; Reuters Messaging: rm://noah.barkin.reuters.com@reuters.net)

COPYRIGHT

Copyright Thomson Reuters 2009. All rights reserved.
The copying, republication or redistribution of Reuters News Content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Thomson Reuters.

Several points from Georgian perspective on NATO integration and reforms for Georgia's admission

Notwithstanding the politically antagonist nature of political elite and main part of political opposition in Georgia - the desire to eventually join NATO, enjoys overwhelming popular support in Georgia and is one of the few points of agreement (!) among all the major political parties. And results of referendum held during the Presidential elections of 2008 say that 77% of voters stand for Georgian NATO membership.

The more Georgia becomes credible partner for NATO, the more questions arise how can it be a member with two frozen conflicts on its soil in South Ossetia and Abkhazia? In other words should West consider the solution of the conflicts as a pre-condition for acceptance of the country in NATO?

The resolution of these conflicts is not entirely in Georgia’s hands, as outside powers, especially Russia (who is a party of the conflict), wield great influence. To make resolution a precondition for NATO membership would give Russia an effective veto over possible Georgian membership and, in all likelihood, encourage Moscow in its current aggressive policies.

In the history of NATO there are obvious examples when countries become NATO members with unresolved territorial disputes. For most obvious example, ongoing tensions and conflict between Greece and Turkey — even though both have been members of the Alliance for half a century. Historical precedents simply underscore that NATO has been prepared, under different historical and strategic conditions, to bring in new members with unresolved conflicts on their soil.

Despite of the fact that Russia malignly influences both public opinion and political decisions in secessionist regions of Georgia, we should not deny the separatist leaders and their peoples’ feelings. Their resistance to accommodation and reintegration with Georgia reflects honestly felt fears and resentments (I met Abkhazians twice and I had “honour” to feel these disproportionate ethnic hatred as for Georgian), concerns for security, and ignorance of the options available to them. That’s why as a member of Youth Atlantic Community I am working with our friends from YATA to make a change in the informational flow to Abkhazians to inform them about the real values NATO stands for and not watch on the world though Russian prism.

Guaranteed energy security

The geopolitical importance of being energy security transit country facilitates Georgia’s relations with the West. On the Western side, NATO and EU share a common interest in South Caucasus security and the reliability and development of energy supplies. (Regional security is a fundamental issue, vigorously promoted by the European Union. Both NATO Allies and EU institutions have shown a growing interest in the energy security issue, and this region can play an important role as an energy security provider by becoming a major alternative transit route to the Russian pipeline system for the transport of Eurasian energy resources.

Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline and the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline, following the success of these projects, an important agreement for the construction of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway and currently signed NABUCCO, in all of the projects Georgia plays important role. Georgian energy security and political stability directly affects Baku and Ankara and they are of fundamental importance for the future of the region. Regional stability and security are fundamental prerequisites for energy corridor effectiveness and Georgia’s commitment by continuing reforming institutions is of prime importance in order to achieve final goal – secured region by getting membership of NATO.

Economic benefit by energy projects

The East-West energy corridor has a clear geopolitical added value for Georgia: development, stability, reliability and relevance, if so perceived in western eyes, can result in further political and economic gains for Tbilisi. For Georgia the energy corridor means to foster its independence, stabilize the country and develop the national economy. Moreover, economic growth and the development of the transit corridor can improve stability by rendering local conflict resumption undesirable, for both economic and political reasons. On the one hand economic development exerts a strong attraction which is difficult to resist for Western allies, while on the other hand Moscow’s policy of restoring regional political control with every means including military acts as a deterrent.

At the present time energy security is a topical issue and some NATO members have openly shown their interest in the role that Georgia can play in this field, thanks to its geographical position, and have supported its accession. For Eastern European countries, support for Georgian accession can be understood both in historical terms and in terms of promoting stability in EU neighbourhood regions. Moreover it is reasonable to think that the prospect of membership and actual accession would accelerate democratization.

While for NATO energy security means new tasks and introduces new fields of coordination with its member and partner states, it can also be a stimulus to enhance regional cooperation and favour stability. It is in this context that Georgia’s role in regional energy security can be analyzed.

To conclude Georgian government needs knowledge to consolidate public choice and choose the correct political vector, strength to pass this way and faith not to be afraid of challenges.

What are Atlantic Community values and aims?

Voices of Freedom- YATA event in Slovakia

YOUTH EVENT- Voices of Freedom

The main aim of the Voices of Freedom event is to address young people in an interactive way, to stimulate them towards thinking about common values that we share in the 21st century and which give us the irreplaceable opportunity for our active self-development. The voice refers to a mean for expressing the beliefs and opinions. Thanks to those young people who strived for their voices to be heard in the streets of 1989, we are free to express our ideas and opinions nowadays. It is essential to remind that security, as well as freedom of speech, is not a matter of course. Twenty years of democracy in Slovakia has resulted into our right to speak different voices, to confront them and to learn from each other.

At the very end of the exceptional event, Mr. Jean Francois Bureau, NATO ASG, will introduce "Voices of NATO", short movie made of interviews that we made in the Slovak Atlantic Commission on the occasion of NATO´s 60th Anniversary and 20 years of democracy in Slovakia. The event will be attend by 60 young professionals in international relations and foreign policy, 25 from Youth Atlantic Treaty Association.

To see program of the event, please go to http://www.ncbc.sk, section "Voices of Freedom"

I am looking forward to see you there,

Miroslav

World Politicians in Bratislava

Dear YATA colleagues,

Slovakia will have a unique opportunity to host the NATO Defence Ministers Meeting this Wednesday and Thursday. At this occasion, it is expected the participation of more than 28 defence ministers and tens of other important guests from both sides of the Atlantic.

Slovakia has never hosted such an important event and it will be the only opportunity to host such a significant one for a long time. In order to utilize and multiply the presence of the defence ministers in Bratislava, the Slovak Atlantic Commission is organising– in cooperation with the Slovak Ministry of Defence and NATO Public Diplomacy Division – the only official accompanying conference of the NATO Defence Ministers Meeting in Bratislava- "New Challenges, Better Capabilities".

The intention of the conference is to interconnect the political debate, which will take place in a confidential atmosphere in a closed circle of the defence ministers, with a broader Slovak and international security community in the region and to transfer the debate to a more informal setting outside of the murals of the official NATO meeting.

You can watch the conference online as well! Just visit http://www.ncbc.sk or www.nato.int
Program and speakers of the conference you can find here: http://www.ata-sac.org/ncbc/uploads/documents/Preliminary%20Program.pdf

We will also have a Youth event "Voices of Freedom", attended by 60 young people, 25 of them from YATA.

Best wishes,

Miroslav

Hello everybody,

Here's an interesting article concerning the conversation about Afganistan in China.

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security-council/index-of-countries-on-the-security-council-agenda/afghanistan/48248.html

Best
Antti

Brzezinski: “If Georgia or Ukraine falter, Russia again becomes an empire.”

Voice of America, Ukrainian Service Washington, DC 13/10/2009

In an interview with the Voice of America’s Ukrainian Service, former US national security adviser, currently CSIS Counselor and Trustee Zbigniew Brzezinski shares his views on the Obama administrations’ initiative to “reset” relations with Russia, on dilemmas the US faces in its policies toward Eastern Europe, particularly Ukraine, as well as on challenges facing Ukraine today and following the next presidential elections in January. The interview was conducted by Myroslava Gongadze.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBxH3sfpmEA&feature=player_embedded

MG: In the process of “resetting” relations with Russia it seems that the Obama administration still has not formulated a US strategy toward the region, toward Eastern Europe and particularly toward Ukraine. What do you think should be the new administration’s priorities in that part of the world?

ZB: I think the Obama administration has a good slogan – “reset.” But it’s also very vague and a little childish. You don’t “reset” a serious relationship. You try to strategically shape it. And I think the United States has essentially two seemingly contradictory goals to pursue, which, in fact, ultimately are not contradictory. One of them is to have a more cooperative relationship with Russia. Russia is an important country. We do have some common interests, which we ought to pursue, for example, in South-Central Asia, the issue of the Iranian nuclear program, disarmament, nuclear stability in general. These are legitimate and important objectives. But we also have another objective, namely, the consolidation of political pluralism in the space of the former Soviet Union and of the former Soviet bloc. That means, for example, and very specifically, again, that Georgia is not undermined, that Ukraine is not turned into a satellite. Now, superficially, these two objectives may seem in conflict. But in fact they are not. Because if Georgia survives, if Ukraine prospers, the chances are, in fact, greater in the long run that Russia will become a post-imperial democratic state. If Georgia or Ukraine falter, Russia again becomes an empire, with growing ambitions, which makes a long-term profitable relationship with it more difficult. So the contradiction is in fact superficial. In reality, we have to pursue intelligently both aspects of our relationship in a larger sense with Russia and that cannot be defined by a simple slogan such as “reset” the relationship.

MG: Do you agree with Senator Lugar, who said that the United States have to be more active in Ukraine, especially in this period leading up to the presidential elections?

ZB: I agree with that and I have been saying things of this sort for a long time myself. But, quite honestly, since this is addressed to a Ukrainian audience, I have to say in all frankness, that the ultimate responsibility for preserving Ukrainian independence rests on the shoulders of the Ukrainian people and of the Ukrainian elite. And I find it depressing to look at the top-level divisions in the democratic independence camp, at the internal feuding, at the intrigues, at the opportunities for a foreign power to manipulate internal affairs in Ukraine. And being of Polish origin I am also aware of the fact that what Ukraine is experiencing today is depressingly similar to what Poland experienced in the Eighteenth century. At that time Poland was essentially dominated by an elite that was aristocratic, that was wealthy, that was entrenched in various interests, and was manipulated by foreign powers, such as Prussia, Austria, and Russia. And the result was the loss of independence. Today, we have an oligarchic elite in Ukraine, that is in the pay of foreign interests, that is manipulating the wealth of the country for its own benefit and is not genuinely committed to the shaping of a nationally based Ukrainian democracy, which can then be an attractive object of European expansion. You cannot expect the Europeans west of Ukraine or people here in America to be more pro-Ukrainian than the Ukrainians. And I say this with emphasis, because Ukraine is now approaching presidential elections and these elections are going to be manipulated from the outside, for the purpose of reducing Ukrainian independence, perhaps even of turning Ukraine again into a satellite or even part of a larger imperial system, including perhaps even some loss of territory.

MG: When you are talking about “from the outside,” what do you mean?

ZB: I think most Ukrainians know what I am talking about. And if they don’t know, then they are so politically uneducated after twenty years of independence that it would almost despairing.

MG: When there is a new president in Ukraine, what do you think should be his or her main goals in terms of domestic policy and foreign policy?

ZB: Well, I would say it’s the same thing, domestic and foreign, that is to say to really consolidate a genuinely respectable democracy in Ukraine, which makes Ukraine an attractive object of interest for the rest of Europe. Culturally, Ukraine is a part of Europe. It is important to translate that into political, socio-economic realities. Nobody in Europe was begging Poland to be part of the European Union. The Poles became part of the European Union because they became attractive to the European Union. They showed that they’re determined to be a European state in every respect. That made it possible for Poland to be what it is today. Ukraine could be like Poland in five to ten years, with the right leadership and with the right national
orientation.

MG: One more question – about the future of Ukraine in NATO. Some say Ukraine could have a better relationship with Russia even if it became a member of NATO or of any other security organization in Europe. Do you agree with that? Do you see Ukraine in NATO?

ZB: I think it depends again on the attitude of the Ukrainian people. If Ukraine becomes a part of NATO, as a country split within, with limited support for membership in NATO, it’s not going to help Ukraine, because it will become in itself a source of division, which other powers can exploit. The point of departure for membership in NATO is a Ukrainian national identity that has a defined geopolitical outlook and on the basis of a significant national unanimity then desires to be part of NATO. Look again at the experience of Poland. Poland did not become a member of NATO with only thirty percent of the people favoring membership in NATO. It was the overwhelming desire of the people to be in NATO that convinced NATO that the addition of Poland would be a source of greater stability in Central Europe, and would in fact enhance the NATO alliance and make the European situation more stable. If Poland was not a member of NATO, but divided within, Poland could today be in the same situation as Georgia. That is not the option that the Ukrainians should entertain. It’s about time that the political elite of Ukraine and the new generation of Ukrainians, in a calm and rational fashion, consider how best to structure their relationship with Europe, and with Russia, in such a way that Ukraine is a viable, secure, independent state. And that does not mean antagonism towards Russia. It doesn’t mean moving to NATO in order to be anti-Russian. It means creating a wider system of European stability and cooperation, in which Ukraine, a country of forty-five million people, potentially a wealthy country, could play a very important role, thereby also encouraging Russia to move more to the West. I think Ukraine, in a way, can help to shape the future of Russia, and to give Russia greater security and a role to play in the world. Because, otherwise, a Russia between a billion and a half Chinese, 550 million Europeans – much wealthier than the Russians -- will be an empty space with a declining population. So, in many respects, if Ukraine evolves constructively, it can help assure Russia a much more promising future.

Portuguese ATA/YATA Newsletter - 14th PAYS

(14th PAYS visit to NATO Joint Command Lisbon)

The September Edition of the Portuguese Atlantic Committee/Portuguese Atlantic Youth Association Newsletter has just been released. This is a special number, in english, concerning the 14th PAYS, which took place in the first week of August, addressing the theme of NATO's New Strategic Concept. You can download it here.

ISAF Strategy in Afghanistan

In these crucial times, when a renewed strategy for Afghanistan stabilization is still under way, it is extremely important to try to view the current situation with the boots in the ground.
An initial assesment by General Mc Crystal, Commander of ISAF Mission, was made public on the 30th of August.
Please read the full report here, to get more information on what is the situation in the country and some first proposals.

NATO's future

This week I attended a seminar on 3D in the Hague, the Netherlands. 3D is a now famous concept that wishes to combine the works of Defence, Diplomacy and Development in the best possible way in conflict areas. At this conference I was hoping to be informed on the successes of 3D and the development this concept had gone through in the latter years, but to my surprise and sadness the most confusion was araised about what the concept really is, who 'owns' it and which country executes in the best way.

Please let me say this: Nobody 'owns' 3D, it is not a model or a template that can be executed in every conflict siutuation or area and 3D is so much more than the 3 D's that we were talking about. One of the speakers, a former commander of a Provincial Reconstruction Team in Afghanistan was clearly upset about all the other politicians, diplomats, historians who were present as speakers at this seminar. He was the only one who really kwew what it was all about: an holistic approach. 3D is at least another few more D's and the rest of the alfabet in order to assist, develop, help, educate, safeguard, listen, and a whole lot more at the service of the Afghan people. Because these people is what it is all about: to make them proud of their own lives and own country.

I was glad to know that this Dutch commander, who was really executing the 3D concept had been to Afghanistan and was working there, and not the other speakers.

YATA Newsletter July 2009 and Call For Contributions for the September Edition

Dear friends,

The July Edition of the YATA Newsletter has just been released. You can download it on our website.

 

The September edition will be out soon. Please send your photos, reports, articles and contributions to vp-communication@atlantic-youth.org until September 15th.

Best regards,

Samuel de Paiva Pires

YATA Vp for Communications and Programming

Putin's letter to the Poles

Janek Skarzynski/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

On Aug. 31, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin sent a letter to the Polish people where he undertake an historical effort to analyze W.W.II events, 70 years after its beginning.

The full text can be seen here, but below I have pasted a couple remarkable sencences.

"There is no doubt that one can have all the reasons to condemn the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact concluded in August of 1939."

"The people of Russia, whose destiny was crippled by the totalitarian regime, fully understand the sensitiveness of Poles about Katyn where thousands of Polish servicemen lie. Together we must keep alive the memory of the victims of this crime."

Tones and words must have been cautiously chosen, as to avoid a broaden historical revisionism on the World War II events! Indeed, The final idea one might get from the letter is a mix of history remembrance and veiled apologizes.

How will Polish government - but expecially Polish people - react is hard to say. Surely the letter can be either criticized for beign just a public diplomacy effort to get a better bargaining position with US Administration, or considered as a genuine reapprochement between to old adversaries. Only time will tell!