Archive for category Moldova

Ukraine-Moldova race to EU visa-free regime

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Eastern partnership, Moldova, Ukraine on November 14, 2011

This will probably make boring reading, but for those with some stamina to go through typically unreadable, but important, EU-speak here is a comparison of how Ukraine and Moldova perform on their way towards a visa-free regime with the EU. The assessment is based on the recent progress reports by the European Commission on the implementation of the Action Plans on visa liberalisation by Ukraien and Moldova. (The relevant documents are here: Action Plans for Ukraine and Moldova outlining the conditions; and the progress reports for Ukraine and Moldova evaluating progress September 2011).

The progress reports are mainly concerned with legislative adjustments, which correspond to Phase 1 of the Action Plan. Evaluating realities will come next years. In order to somehow quantify the conclusions I also decided to give a ‘plus’ to the country that is ahead with some reforms, and a ‘minus’ to the country that lags behind the other (a simplified version of what ESI did with the Schengen White List project). Giving just plusses and minuses is of course quite simplistic, but nonetheless a useful exercise for a ‘quick and dirty’ look at where Moldova and Ukraine stand in relation to each other. I also decided to give additional bonuses in the form of half or full plusses to some areas which are much more important than the others (like introduction of biometric passports – a full plus, or half-pluses to having a half-functioning migration service or having implementing protocols for readmission agreements with EU member states). Read the rest of this entry »

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Of Eastern & Southern neighbours

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Eastern partnership, EU, Moldova, South Caucasus, Ukraine on February 14, 2011

Just when the southern neighbourhood of the EU is shaken by a wave of revolutionary situations that toppled consolidated dictatorships in Tunisia and Egypt, the eastern neighbourhood seems to be in the middle of a trend towards authoritarian consolidation. So the paradox is that whereas the Southern neighbours look like those in the East in the revolutionary years of 2003-2005, but in fast forward mode, the Eastern neighbourhood seems to look increasingly like the south a few years ago – a collection of states with increasingly close economic relations with Europe, but with centralised, non-competitive politics, which routinely afford to ignore the EU on many political and security questions. Today, every country in the Eastern neighbourhood except Moldova is less pluralistic than it was 5 years ago (though Belarus arguably could not become worse).

Seen from Ukraine, Moldova or most of the new EU member states one of the most irritating aspects of the European neighbourhood policy is that it dumps together the Southern and the Eastern neighbours of the EU. The Eastern neighbours tend to be rather arrogant about the Mediterannean neighbours of the EU. The argument goes that you cannot approach ‘European’ neighbours of the EU and ‘neighbours of Europe’ like Morocco or Syria through the same policy lenses; Read the rest of this entry »

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Democracy and reformism in EU’s neighbourhood

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Eastern partnership, Moldova, South Caucasus, Ukraine on January 11, 2011

Throughout the 90s in Central and Eastern Europe, and later in the Balkans reformism and democracy tended to go hand in hand. Governments which were more respectful of democratic norms, also tended to be more reformist. (By ‘democracy’ I mean respect for human rights, media freedoms and opposition parties. And by ‘reformism’ I mean the implementation of reforms such as fighting corruption, cutting red tape, improving the business climate, modernising state institutions like police, customs, tax inspectorates  or the border guards.)

In a sense, the 90s was a simpler world in which Meciar, Tudjman or Milosevic were undemocratic and non-reformist; whereas Dzurinda, Mesic, and Djindjic were both reformist and democratic. The good and the bad guys were obvious; the black was clearly distinguishable from the white. And the EU’s approach to these governments was shaped by this unbreakable link between reformism and democracy.

But it seems that the Eastern neighbourhood is different. There is much more grey than black and white. Categorising the likes of Yuschenko, Timoshenko, Saakashvili, Putin and Medvedev is more difficult. The link between being reformist and being democratic is much more blurred. Some are reformist, but less democratic; some are more democratic, but less reformist; and some are neither reformist, nor democratic.

Think of the following examples. ‘Orange Ukraine’ in 2005-2010 was the most democratic post-Soviet state with a vibrant media, lively parliament and vociferous opposition. But it was hardly reformist. Few deep reforms were even tried, let alone successfully implemented. Read the rest of this entry »

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Moldova’s fin de regime

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Moldova on September 23, 2009

Moldova’s transfer of power is in full swing, confirming an earlier claim I made that Moldova is the only post-Soviet state (the Baltics aside) where every single transfer of power since 1991 took place through a tortuous, but still uninterrupted, cycle of elections. (Though, to be fair, Ukraine is more pluralistic and is likely to have a transfer of power through elections in Januari 2010.

Voronin’s fin de regime

On 9/11 Vladimir Voronin announced his resignation. Except for Communist party members few ventured to say a good word about Voronin’s eight years in power and except for the pro-Communist TV channels few seemed to regret it. It was also striking just how short and muted the farewell was (see a piece I wrote on that in Romanian). When Eltsin or Shevardandze resigned (in 1999 and 2003 respectively) their departures were historical events that sparked heated discussions in talk-shows, newspapers, or public transportation for days, if not weeks. You could not avoid thinking of their (mixed) historical legacy and you could not avoid a pervasive sense of entering a new epoch. Read the rest of this entry »

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Russian and EU power of attraction

Posted by Nicu Popescu in EU, Moldova, Russia, South Caucasus, Ukraine on September 13, 2009

(MORE updates…) Here is an interesting opinion poll (Eurasia Monitor) where post-Soviet publics are asked whether they prefer integration into the EU, union of Russia/Belarus/Ukraine/Kazakhstan or independence without integration with any such entities. The results broadly confirm some of the findings from our recent ECFR report on Russian and European neighbourhood policies which argues that EU soft power in the region is not uncotested.

Among the more interesting results are (see page 35 of this opinion poll):

  • Georgia comes first in pro-EU sentiment  with 36% being in favour of integration with the EU. But it also comes first in pro-independence sentiment with 48% (not willing to join any integrationist blocks). Unsurprisingly only 3% want integration into a Russian-led Union. Read the rest of this entry »

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Moldova defies post-Soviet traditions

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Europe (un)divided, Moldova on August 8, 2009

Revolutions, staged successions and consolidated authoritarianism replaced “elections” in practically all the post-Soviet countries. Against such a background the best news from Moldova’s recent elections is the lack of any other event but the election results. In the last decade, in CIS there have been only two changes of power through elections only (where the governing party goes into opposition after the counting of the votes, not street protests) and both of them were in Moldova: in 2001 when the Communists came to power, and in 2009 when they lost it. These last years Moldova’s political system was highly centralized (and less pluralistic than Ukraine’s). And still Moldova is the only CIS country with an uninterrupted cycle of legal and constitutional transfers of power through elections since its independence in 1991. The pendulum of power is swinging with great difficulties but without interruption, while in all other post-Soviet states the pendulum has either stopped for now, or has been terribly dysfunctional. This is an almost surprising achievement for a state that is rural, semi-depopulated, has a separatist conflict and the lowest GDP per capita in Europe (yes, lower than Albania’s).

Selections vs elections

For the last decade, post-Soviet states have developed three types of managing transitions of power. None of these included “elections”:

  • The first is the model of not transfering power at all. This is the case of Belarus, Azerbaijan and the Central Asian “stans” (with the partial exception of Kyrgyzstan);
  • the second model is “project successor”, where an incumbent president passes power to a chosen successor who is then confirmed through popular “selections” (as opposed to “elections”). Read the rest of this entry »

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A Swedish-led listening tour of the East

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Eastern partnership, EU, Europe (un)divided, Moldova, Russia, South Caucasus on June 22, 2009

The Swedish EU presidency, which starts on 1 July 2009, is getting a lot of advice on what to do during its presidency. But here is one idea more idea for the Swedish EU presidency (contained in our recent ECFR report on the Eastern neighbourhood). The Swedish Presidency should convene a “listening tour” of the Eastern neighbourhood – a Troika visit by the Swedish foreign minister, Javier Solana, the Commissioner for External Relations, and the future Spanish EU presidency to each of the six Eastern neighbours of the EU: Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Russia). Here is why such a tour is needed and why the Swedish presidency is the best actor to initiate it.

To begin with, the Eastern Partnership summit in Prague, judged by its attendance list, was a near-failure. If the objective of the Eastern partnership was to relaunch the neighbourhood policy and raise its political profile, its start was not impressive. The Swedish presidency-led “listening tour” would help relaunch politically the neighbourhood policy in the East. It would repair some of the political damage done by the unimpressive Eastern partnership summit in May 2009. But the purpose of such a tour should not only be symbolic. Read the rest of this entry »

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On the meanings of “war”

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Moldova, secessionist conflicts, South Caucasus, trips on June 11, 2009

Wars are defining moments in the life of states and nations. Throughout history wars often gave birth to nations, or caused the disappearance of states. Most nations had fought many wars, but almost every nation has one war to which they refer to as “the war”. For a German, Greek or Serb the term “before the war” means entirely different things and different periods.

I just spent a few days in Abkhazia and Tbilisi. I will write more about the trip in the following days. But it was interesting to see that the word “war” refers to different historical events. For the Georgians the phrase “after the war” means “after the August 2008 war”. Read the rest of this entry »

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New priorities in Georgia and Moldova

Posted by Nicu Popescu in Eastern partnership, Moldova, secessionist conflicts, South Caucasus on May 18, 2009

As Moldova and Georgia are plunging into political crisis, increasing polarisation, and growing tensions between the government and opposition EU’s priorities in these countries suddenly look different than a few months ago. This is clearly captured by what the EU special representatives (EUSR) to these countries are doing. If EU special representatives for South Caucasus and Moldova were appointed (in 2003 and 2005 respectively) to deal primarily with secessionist conflicts, now they have to deal primarily with domestic political crises.

When Georgia plunged into crisis in November 2007, Peter Semneby, EUSR for South Caucasus, flew immediately to Tbilisi and sought to diffuse the crisis by mediating between government and opposition. As the opposition launched again a series to rallies to unseat president Saakashvili less than two months ago, Peter Semneby is trying again to diffuse the crisis through mediation. Read the rest of this entry »

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EU’s Borders and Neighbours

Posted by Nicu Popescu in EU, Europe (un)divided, Moldova, South Caucasus, Ukraine on May 4, 2009

Jan Zielonka argued in his book “Europe as Empire” that Europe is becoming a neo-medieval empire with ‘overlapping authorities, divided sovereignty, diversified institutional arrangements, and multiple identities’ with ‘fuzzy cultural, economic and political borders between the enlarged Union and its new neighbours further east and south east’. Indeed, the medieval parallel is useful in thinking about Europe’s borders, but a more accurate comparison is probably to think about medieval fortresses, not borders.

Exporting border controls

A fortress has multiple lines of defence – a dungeon as the hard nucleus and defensive walls, but also external fortifications such as ditches or earthworks (see a formidable fortress, left). The EU has been developing a similarly multilayered system of border management and protection with elements of outside fortifications. With the Schengen area as the dungeon, non-Schengen EU member states such as Romania and Bulgaria (and the other new EU states until December 2007) already separated from the outside world by a strong visa wall, the EU has started to build outside fortifications. Read the rest of this entry »

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