Presseurop |

Eurovision 2012 | Baku intent on buying respectability (Eesti Päevaleht, Tallinn)

Fri, 25 May 2012 12:05:37 +0100

This year’s Eurovision Song Contest is hosted by Azerbaijan, a country that is far from being a model democracy. An Estonian journalist takes a critical look at the deferential treatment enjoyed by the regime in Baku. (Article)

Eurovision | Rambo Amadeus, the cliché slayer (Tportal , Zagreb)

Fri, 18 May 2012 14:44:54 +0100

The joyfully subversive turbo-funk singer will represent Montenegro at this year’s Eurovision with “Euro neuro” — a humorous and highly accurate enumeration of clichés about the Balkans and their relationship with the EU. (Article)

Eastern Partnership | The East, not on the EU's mind (Polityka, Warsaw)

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 18:18:26 +0100

As the Eastern Partnership summit opens in Warsaw, the EU, which is caught up in the ongoing financial crisis, appears to have little enthusiasm for the project, launched by Poland in 2008. As for the partner countries, they continue to present a wide spectrum of political systems, ranging from dictatorship to democracy. (Article)

Eastern Partnership | A policy that moves slowly, but surely (Gazeta Wyborcza, Warsaw)

Mon, 11 Jul 2011 17:59:43 +0100

Two years ago, led by Poland, the EU launched its Eastern Partnership with countries of the former USSR. Now that Warsaw is preparing to take over the rotating presidency, experts are painting a rather dispiriting outcome for this project. (Article)

Diplomacy | 5 billion to aid Arab revolutions

Thu, 26 May 2011 14:54:49 +0100

Within the framework of its Neighbourhood Policy, "the EU has made democracy a condition for aid to Arab countries," headlines the daily El País. On 25 May, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs, Catherine Ashton, and the Commissioner for European Neighbourhood Policy, Štefan Füle, presented the new strategy for the 16 countries that are the European Union’s neighbours on its eastern and southern borders. Of the seven billion euros of aid to be distributed between now and 2013, five billion has been earmarked for countries on the southern shores of the Mediterranean.

Until now, points out El País, in its approach to countries like Egypt and Tunisia "the EU strategy has been based on the principle of ‘security in exchange for millions of euros.’” The parameters that have now been announced -- free elections, freedom of speech in the press, an independent judiciary, the fight against corruption, and democratic control of security and armed forces -- will enable Europe to measure the level of democracy in these countries. The Madrid daily notes that the plan unveiled by the European diplomacy chief also includes measures for the control of migration flows. However, it points out that "Ashton has denied that the plan offers money to prevent immigration."

(News in brief)

Natural Gas | Moscow scores against Brussels again

Tue, 12 Oct 2010 16:20:26 +0100

"In the muted but high-stakes war between the EU and Russia to control the gas pipelines from Central Asia to Europe, Moscow has just racked up another point against Brussels,” writes La Tribune. Wintershall, a German subsidiary of the chemical colossus BASF, is about to sign on to the South Stream project. "This is another hard knock for Nabucco, the rival gas pipeline project backed by the EU, which was to bypass Russia in transporting gas from Central Asia.” According to the French financial daily, “the advent of a German company will end up discrediting this $25bn-plus (€18bn-plus) project”. Initiated by Russia’s Gazprom, South Stream is backed by the Italian oil and gas utility ENI. In the spring of 2010, the two corporations bolstered the project’s European credentials by both pledging to transfer 10% of theirs stakes to the French utility EDF.

Nabucco, on the other hand, appears increasingly unconvincing, adds the French daily, for want of sufficient natural gas reserves to justify its construction. Gazprom has in fact “methodically drained the Central Asian gas reserves by clinching multiple long-term purchase contracts in the region, thereby reducing by as much the volumes that Nabucco could carry". As Pierre Noël, an energy specialist at Cambridge University, explains to La Tribune, "By announcing the construction of the gas pipeline even before securing the gas reserves, Brussels killed the project."

But South Stream still has issues of its own to address. According to the EUobserver, Koen Minne, the CEO of the Belgian group Enex, is supposed to sign a deal for compressed natural gas (CNG) with Turkmenistan in November. Under that agreement, Enex and a consortium of European companies are to transport between 3 and 4 billion cubic metres p.a. of Turkoman gas to the EU. The gas would be shipped across the Caspian Sea to Azerbaijan, then relayed to the EU via the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum Azero-Turkish pipeline.

(News in brief)

Europe / Asia | Stalin's dream to come true

Thu, 07 Oct 2010 17:09:16 +0100

România liberă reports that "a Russian-Kazakh working group will shortly announce the launch of a project to build 700-km long canal between the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea." The "Eurasia" canal, "will have a profound impact on Central Asian geopolitics, enabling Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Iran to become naval powers, and for Russia to realise Stalin’s dream for a navigable canal that would bring China closer to Europe."

According to the Bucharest daily, "the boon of greater economic and geo-strategic access to Asia will not only be of benefit to the Russians". The 25-billion euro project will also facilitate access to the Caspian Sea oil reserves, and its capacity will be doubled by a future network of motorways to link Russia and China." România libera has calculated "that if the canal attracts just 5% of the current maritime freight traffic between China and Europe, countries on the new route will receive an additional 2.2 billion euros in tax revenue every year." On this basis, the daily points out that the European Union should hurry "to present its long awaited strategy for the Danube, which flows into the Black Sea."

(News in brief)

Romania | White Stream II aims to sideline Nabucco

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 13:52:44 +0100

In the wake of an agreement between Romania, Georgia and Azerbaijan on the construction of a new pipeline to link Caspian Sea gas fields to Europe, România liberă announces: "Romania achieves its goal of becoming the EU's Black Sea energy terminal." The White Stream II pipeline project, which the daily describes as "an ideal solution for Europe," will have the capacity to "transport 20 billion cubic metres of gas to the European Union starting in 2012" – enough to put an end to "Europe's dependence on supplies from Russia." The cost of the project – between 2 and 4 billion euros – makes it "the most attractive option for the EU." Though it should be noted that it will be in direct competition with the considerably more expensive Nabucco pipeline – from Iran to Central Europe via Turkey – which has already been the subject of hard-fought negotiations within the EU. Another advantage of the project, remarks România liberă, "is the major positive impact it will have on Romania's geopolitical interests in the Black Sea."

(News in brief)

All quiet on the Eastern front | Editorial

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 18:31:58 +0100

Do strategic partnerships serve any real purpose? Eight months after the launch of the Eastern Partnership (EaP) with the former Soviet republics of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldavia and Ukraine, the EU has little to show for its efforts. And while we are on the topic, what has become of the Union for the Mediterranean? When it was announced 18 months ago, we were told that it would bring together countries on both sides of the Mare Nostrum – a likely story. The Eastern Partnership has not become a household name, not even in Brussels. Of course, you could argue that European officials have been so preoccupied by the fate of the Lisbon Treaty that they have had time for little else. On the occasion of the first meeting of the EaP on 8 December in Brussels, foreign ministers of the 27 member states along with their six counterparts from the former Soviet republics were forced to admit that they did not have much to boast about apart from the hint of a possible U-turn in the attitude of Russia, which may now consider joining the initiative – but nothing really forward looking, and certainly nothing concrete. However, there was some hope that a deal to set up a European Investment Bank fund for lending to EaP countries which was sponsored by the Czech presidency of the EU could bear fruit in 2010. The fact that a Czech, Štefan Füle, has also been put in charge of the new Commission's portfolio for enlargement may also be significant. If he is to make progress, Mr Füle will have to convince the governments of several countries including Russia, that there is a point to the EaP, which Dmitri Medvedev described as "useless." So as not to hurt our feelings the Russian President was careful to add that the EaP is "not dangerous," as if we did not know that already. Let's hope that the reign of the new Commission will help the partners to overcome their fears and prejudices so that they can finally exert a positive influence on developments to the east of Europe's borders. I.B.G.

(Editorial)

Romania | Torn between two pipelines

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 13:05:39 +0100

Nabucco, Nord Stream and South Stream were on the agenda for the Black Sea Energy Forum, organized by the American think tank, the Atlantic Council of the United States, which was held from 30 September to 2 October in Bucharest. Among the main countries concerned by the planned gas pipelines, Italy is eager to point out that Nabucco and South Stream should not be viewed as competing but complementary projects. "False!" Experts warn that there will not be "enough gas to feed all of the pipelines" – a fact which prompts România Libera to announce: "The first one completed is the winner." The quarrel has only just begun, because the Nabucco pipeline passes through 500 km of Romanian territory, for which reason Bucharest is being courted by Gazprom and its Italian partners, who want the country to take part in South Stream. "All of the countries involved in the project are playing on both teams, so as to avoid disappointment," observes the daily. Romania is apparently the first country to have received an offer of 7.3 billion cubic metres of gas from a mysterious "friendly nation" if Nabucco is completed before South Stream. The Bucharest daily notes that the offer comes hot on the heels of the signing of an energy agreement between Romania and Azerbaijan.

(News in brief)

Gas | All pipelines lead to Ankara (Die Zeit, Hamburg)

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 14:31:56 +0100

Ankara is the neighbour Europeans still won’t let into their club. And yet the country behind the Bosporus is soon to become the communication hub for energy supplies bound for Europe. Die Zeit doubts the EU can go on snubbing the Turks indefinitely. (Article)