| The Russian press on Wednesday broadly lauded agreements
signed a day
earlier by Russia and the European Union on the EU's expansion, putting
a
positive spin on even the points widely considered to be Russian
concessions.
"Europe Backs Down," the Vedomosti and Gazeta dailies proclaimed
in
one voice.
Gazeta said the potential "damage" to Russian trade from
the EU's
expansion has now been halved from the commonly cited figure of $150 million
per year. An agreement on the duty-free transit of goods to the exclave
of
Kaliningrad and various other trade concessions are "a big success
for
Russian negotiators, experts say," Gazeta wrote.
Kommersant went even further, linking the EU expansion to Russian
hopes for WTO accession. "As compensation for being willing to talk,
Brussels gave Moscow 16 export guarantees, and this is a sign of a softening
EU position in regard to Russia's accession to the WTO," the paper
said,
without elaborating.
The EU and Russia signed an agreement Tuesday on the expansion of the
EU to Russia's western borders and to extend the EU and Russia's Partnership
and Cooperation Agreement to 10 new EU members on Saturday. Under it,
the EU
will drop customs duties on cargo shipments between mainland Russia and
Kaliningrad, lower trade tariffs, raise Russian steel quotas and honor
existing contracts to supply Russian fuel to new members' nuclear power
plants.
Many newspapers proclaimed a hazy joint statement on minorities as
a
victory for Russian negotiators. In what was widely seen abroad as a Russian
concession, the statement makes no mention of Latvia and Estonia, two
new
members that Russia had wanted named to address its concerns that they
discriminate against Russian-speaking minorities.
Vedomosti, which uncharacteristically devoted most of its EU article
to the joint statement on minorities, said Russian negotiators are treating
the statement as "our victory." It goes on to quote an expert
who feared the
agreement could be used by the EU to press Russia on its human rights
violations in Chechnya.
State-owned Rossiiskaya Gazeta ran a short article noting that Estonia
has begun moving its border troops from the Latvian to the Russian border
and plans to spend 64 million euros ($76 million) to strengthen the Russian
frontier.
Perhaps tellingly, no Russian paper ran the EU story on the front
page -- not even Izvestia, which sent a correspondent to Luxembourg for
the
signing.
In academic circles, meanwhile, the EU issue remained on the forefront
Wednesday, with leading scholars and experts sitting down at a round table
to ponder why Russia and the EU have made so little progress in an area
where their interests converge -- security.
"Russia and the EU could complement each other in security more
than in any other area ... yet this is not the case," said Alexei
Arbatov, head of an international security think tank at the Russian
Academy of Sciences and a former deputy chairman of the State Duma's Defense
Committee.
Arbatov said that while sharing positions on the seriousness of
threats such as terrorism and proliferation, the two sides have not advanced
far in practical cooperation. In part, the lack of cooperation is rooted
in
Europe's failure to develop its own military and security capacity in
the
form of a rapid deployment corps independent of NATO, he said.
Growing anti-Western sentiments in Russia also hinders closer security
cooperation with the EU, he said.
Another hurdle is an unwillingness by many EU member states to let
Russia help make decisions in security, said Sergei Oznobishchev, director
of the Institute for National Strategic Studies.
"Russia has been assigned this golden chair where it is supposed
to
sit and do what it pleases -- such as whistle -- but not play any role
in
the decision-making process," Oznobishchev said.
See also:
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Russia-EU
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