Cold politics and lots of Russian gas to heat them up – a debate on EU-Russia relations
Last Tuesday, Maastricht Debates , in conjunction with the study association Concordantia, invited three experts to take part in a public debate on the political and strategic relationship between the EU and Russia at the Auditorium of the Economics Faculty. The lecture hall was packed up to the last row with an interested public; some students even sat down on the floor of the side corridor to participate.
Under the heading “the EU and Russia: Strategic Partners or Competing Neighbours?”, the three speakers Hiddo Houben, from the European Commission’s Directorate General for external trade, Marietta Koenig, researcher at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy in Hamburg, and Vladimir Socor, Senior Fellow of the Washington-based Jamestown Foundation, explored how the EU should best deal with Russia and were later open to questions. The audience grasped this opportunity and took part in a hot debate on energy politics, democratic principles and power relations.
What is Russia to Europe?
After a few introducing words by one of the organising students and Chairman Stafford Wadsworth, EU cabinet member Hiddo Houben opened the round of presentations with an analysis of the special relationship that exists between Europe and Russia since the end of the Cold War in the late 1980s.
In a dynamic and easy way, Houben explained the context in which Russia has evolved, underlining that Russia essentially is “Europe, but also something else”. Historically, Russia has largely nurtured strong ties with its western neighbours. The flawed relationship, which only existed during the Cold War period, is now gradually improving again, partly for economic reasons because Russia holds a great portion of the world’s remaining natural gas reserves and is a major energy supplier for Europe. Yet, despite this rapprochement, the two powers still display enormous differences in their understanding of politics and democratic principles.
Even though Houben frowned on some developments in Russia, such as an increased state control at the expense of fundamental civic freedoms, he tried to put Moscow’s policies into perspective. In his view, the move to re-nationalise the Russian energy sector after failed attempts of modernisation and privatisation in the 1990s can be seen a logical and legitimate step to regain power.
Watch Hiddo Houben’s presentation
Yet, the audience’s astonishment about such understanding words towards Russia coming from the mouth of an EU official was soon to be halted. In light of the growing energy dependence, Houben argued, Europe will have few other options but to cooperate with Russia. Therefore it is now up to European governments to collectively offer a new kind of relationship to the newly elected Russian President Medvedev.
Young German researcher Marietta Koenig presented her PhD work on the Caucasus and the wider Black Sea region and compared Russian and European foreign policies in this region. Moscow, she stated, is reluctant to fully recognise the independence of some of its neighbouring states. The EU on the other hand is not able to display a clear strategy towards the whole region. This attitude is also obvious with regards to Kosovo, which has been acknowledged as a sovereign state by some European Member States whereas others refuse to do so. Koenig stressed that Europe has the advantage of being accepted by all international actors and should therefore engage more in embracing the region since it is of major strategic relevance.
In contrast to her stage-experienced colleagues Koenig unfortunately seemed a little nervous. Therefore she had a hard time finding the right words and making her point clear to the audience.
Lastly, research veteran Vladimir Socor used the opportunity to warn Europe of Russia as a “potential source of strategic dangers”. He described the two as “incompatible neighbours” and spent his speaking time emphasising their respective differences. Born in Romania and currently residing in Germany, Socor is now a US citizen and his argument essentially seemed to support US security interests. His employer, the Jamestown Foundation, is known to follow a rather neoconservative agenda in foreign policy.
Moscow, he said, holds an unchecked government which oppresses fundamental freedoms and lacks significant democratic forces. Natural gas is quickly emerging as a substitute to oil and Europe’s heavy reliance on Russian gas supplies puts it in a dangerous situation of dependence.
In his view, the EU needs to agree on a unified strategy towards Russia as soon as possible because different Member States are still playing into Moscow’s hands by competing on its energy supplies. Additionally, he supported a stronger focus on other energy suppliers such as the Caspian Sea region as an alternative to Russian gas supplies.
Watch Vladimir Socor’s presentation (part 1 and part 2)
Debating with the experts
The interesting part of the evening began when Chairman Wadsworth asked the audience to pose questions and to take part in the discussion. Many of the participating students took the chance to express critical remarks and to ask the experts how the existing problems in EU-Russian relations can be solved.
Houben chose to take the role of the devil’s advocate, “for the sake of the debate” as he described it, and continuously pretended to defend Russia’s interests. Yet, being an experienced Brussels bureaucrat, he rather seemed to use his understanding of Russian interests to justify a pragmatic EU approach towards Russia.
At the bottom line, Houben made clear, there is no true alternative to Europe’s energy dependence on Russia. As a consequence, he argued that “a bridge should be built between the mostly deregulated European and the nationalised Russian energy market.”
Socor, on the other hand, kept attacking Moscow’s policies, such as the repeated interruption of energy supplies, and urged Europe to explore alternatives to dependence on Russia.
When a Latvian student from the audience asked the speakers if they saw a “new Cold War” coming up in reference to a book by British journalist Edward Lucas, Koenig and Houben responded diplomatically. They denied the existence of such ideological distinctions as in the past although they conceded different values and an unequal handling of democratic ideas in the West and in Russia.
As the discussion went on, some interesting comments were stated on the European and Russian understanding of making politics. But surprisingly, although the experts repeatedly mentioned democratic shortcomings in Russia, little clarification was provided to questions related to the handling of such problems. In the end, the main issue seemed to be how to keep up a good relationship with Russia in order to ensure European energy security.
Just as in most debates, no real conclusion can be drawn. Energy will certainly play a crucial role in future relations between Europe and Russia and all three experts supported a more uniform EU strategy on this matter. Yet, it remains to be seen how European policy makers will actually deal with Moscow in the coming years. When Chairman Wadsworth ended the discussion due to time limits, some raised arms could still be seen among the audience, indicating a number of unanswered questions.
The last statement was made by Socor who called for caution with regards to Moscow’s power. Currently, he argued, Russia’s priorities in foreign policy are still largely regional. But in a few years time, when its political and military capacities will have regained more strength, its ambitions might become global again. If Socor had had the chance to answer the question about the risk of a “new Cold War”, his response would perhaps have been less favourable than that of his colleagues.
By Tobias Gerhard
Tobias Gerhard is from Bonn, Germany. He is pursuing a Bachelor program in European Studies at Maastricht University since 2005.
