BRUSSELS, 6 December 2004 — The EU is playing a delicate balancing act with Ukraine, dangling the carrot of closer ties as Kiev edges back from all-out crisis, while warning the ex-Soviet state not to expect too much too soon. At the same time the just-expanded European Union is battling to prevent the Ukraine standoff from stretching its already-strained relations with Russia toward breaking point, analysts say.
To that end EU leaders vowed this weekend to do all in their power to ensure the credibility of new elections later this month, after the annulment of polls which have threatened to degenerate into a Cold War-style standoff. “The countries and the institutions of the EU are going to be undoubtedly ready to do whatever it takes” so that new Dec. 26 run-off polls go off smoothly, said a spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana. “It’s essential, first of all for the population of the Ukraine. They deserve a process which is well-organized, fair and transparent. Everything has to be done to help that process now,” spokeswoman Christina Gallach told AFP.
Despite sometimes testy relations with outgoing President Leonid Kuchma, the EU has long sought to edge his vast ex-Communist country toward democratic and economic reform. Since May this year, when the EU staged a “big bang” expansion taking in 10 new members including eight former Soviet bloc states in Central Europe, it has had a lengthy common border with Ukraine itself.
But EU leaders have stopped well short of offering membership of their rich club to Kiev. “Except for the Poles and the Lithuanians ... most Europeans regard the prospect of Ukrainian membership of the EU with horror,” said Katinka Barysch and Charles Grant in a study on the crisis for the Center for European Reform.
Former European Commission chief Romano Prodi, who stepped down last month, famously once said that Ukraine had about as much chance of joining the EU as New Zealand. In principle that position still holds. But in what is perhaps a glimpse of carrot for the undecided masses in Ukraine, new EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner nuanced the message slightly last week. “The question of Ukrainian entry into the EU is not on the agenda. But it is clear that we are not closing any doors,” she told a hastily organized debate on the crisis in the European Parliament.
Solana has already traveled twice to Kiev to help mediate in the crisis pitting pro-Western Viktor Yushchenko against Russia-backed Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich. A new round of talks has been called for Monday in Kiev, at which Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski has confirmed his attendance while Solana is also expected to attend. It is perhaps no coincidence that Warsaw is heavily involved: the EU’s ex-Communist newcomer states are among the most alarmed by Russia’s outspoken views on the standoff.
The Moscow saber-rattling included a condemnation by the Russian Duma Friday of Europe’s “destructive” influence in the crisis. Solana’s spokeswoman dismissed the criticism this weekend. “It’s obvious that this is not true... I don’t think this deserves much of a response because it’s so obvious that this is not the case,” she said.
But analysts warn the stakes are high. The EU “now faces serious problems in its already strained relationship with Russia,” warned Barysch and Grant. “The EU needs to stand up for its principles ... while doing its best to limit the damage to that important relationship.”
Wojciech Sarysz-Wolksi of the European Policy Center warned that Ukraine’s westward drift has slowed in part due to mixed messages from the EU. “The next few years might be a watershed in Ukrainian history,” he said. “The EU cannot turn its back on Ukraine in splendid isolation, as the future costs might be simply too high to bear.”
