October 5, 2007
The acid taste of Russian milk
Diplomats are brought up on charm and courtesy like babies on milk. So it’s always a pleasure to listen to one whose formative years must have involved a certain familiarity with chilli and Tabasco. Meet Vladimir Chizhov, Russia’s energetic and forceful ambassador to the European Union.
At a conference this week of the Friends of Europe think-tank, one speaker after another voiced concern about Russia’s resurgence as a world power under Vladimir Putin. The EU needed to strengthen its institutions so that Europe could speak with one voice in foreign policy, not least to Russia, they said.
Well, there’s no doubt that EU-Russian relations are pretty chilly right now. The omens for the upcoming October 26 EU-Russia summit in Mafra, near Lisbon, are not good. As one expert, Katinka Barysch, puts it: "The list of disagreements between Russia and the EU is getting longer every day."
Perhaps it should have come as no surprise, then, to hear Chizhov’s observations at the Brussels conference. To some of the EU good and great around the table, however, it felt rather as if a long, sharp needle was probing gently under their skin.
First, the white-haired ambassador reminded everyone that Russia was a European country too - in fact, by far the biggest.
Then the needle sank in a few centimetres as Chizhov said the EU lacked a "grand idea" to drive forward its integration. It was hardly likely to be the so-called Lisbon strategy to make the EU the world’s most competitive economic bloc by 2010, because the strategy’s shortcomings meant that it kept getting reinvented every few years, he commented.
In went the needle for the final twist when Chizhov turned to the idea of a united EU foreign policy. What this implied, he said, was one permanent EU seat in the United Nations Security Council, instead of separate seats for France and the UK and even Germany.
"But I think," Chizov concluded, surveying the conference table, "that it might be too early for that."
Ouch!
The Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Committee of the Senate of Canada of which I have been Chairman or vice-Chairman for some years, did a Russia study a few years ago. We met with many senior Russian officials. Some of us met with Mr Putin. As Chairman, I felt that I was not well enough informed about Russia about Russia on the ground. For years, long distance cycling has been hobby of mine. I decided to cycle - over 3 summer holidays - from Berlin to Moscow. On my own. I crossed Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and much of western Russia from Lake Pskov to St Petersburg to Novgorod to Baldai, through all the towns and villages to Moscow. Then I went north around the Golden Ring - which I had never even heard of before crossing the Russian frontier - and ended at Vladimir. I’ve met hundreds of ordainary Russians. Stuck in one village, I spent the night on one of those thousands of wooden houses that belonged to a an aged woman pensioner. She slept in the shed and I had the tiny parlour. When I read the comments about Russia from Europeans and North Americans, I shake my head. Of course Russians are Europeans. What is the difference between the people on west side of Lake Pskov from the people on the east side of Lake Pskov? None. What is the differnce between the people in the wonderful market in Kostroma or the pretty girls walking along the main street and any other place in Western Europe which I know well.
I don’t speak Russian though I studied Greek as a youth and can read the alphabet reasonably well. I just think that the talk about Russia in Western Europe and North America from political chatterers is stupid.
Posted by: Senator Peter Stollery | October 7th, 2007 at 1:22 am | Report this commentWhile the EU may be struggling for ideas to drive integration (though the Single Market, along with democratically-accountable multilateral collaboration seems grand enough to me) it has plenty driving its enlargement/expansion, such as human rights and economic prosperity…
…this is probably what made the Russian ambassador so passive-aggressive…
…the way the world is ossifying into regional power blocs nakedly squabbling over diminishing mineral resources is a pretty depressing prospect.
Posted by: jones | October 8th, 2007 at 10:46 am | Report this commentThanks, Mr. Stollery, Russia is Europe,except for the neocons who want to create conflict to sell advice, Lobby’s fees,lawyers minutae and weapons, the usual traitors ! , and its amazing to see how the Europeans follow the advice of the neocons trying to divide Europe against Russia instead of their own judgment ,morals ,faith (Russia and Europe are christian) and History….never mind,christian europeans and americans don’t even want to know who really financed their wars,so it’s no use…the neocons will always win dividing us as long as christians don’t ask the basic fundamental questions: who finances our wars and who profits from them ?
Posted by: blogger | October 9th, 2007 at 5:08 pm | Report this commentThe Lisbon strategy is unlikely to integrate the European Union, says the Russian ambassador to the EU. Certainly Lisbon seemed to mark the date when European politics decided to capitulate to the market.
Asiatimes had some interesting pieces on the politics last week.
The main views were set out. The extreme ‘laisser-faire’ view is that human nature has the final say in economics; so its embodiment, the market, should not be regulated. The other view is that regulation can be imposed by the imperial powers of the day to avoid catastrophes in their spheres of influence. Both views apparently co-exist within Europe.
The author was in favour of regulation: “It is time for all countries to seek solutions to problems created by the exploitative terms of world trade, by focusing on fundamental issues of domestic development before the prodigal global trading system collapses from its own contradictions and brings forth global depression. Unless and until an equitable international trading system is negotiated, economic nationalism is a proper response to neo-imperialism.”
Regulation may be the only way to avoid a global depression and worse. No wonder the Russian ambassador was sceptical about the EU’s will for progress.
Posted by: Slightly Optimistic | October 15th, 2007 at 3:15 pm | Report this commentSenator Stollery,
you are confusing Russia of Russians with the empire of Putin. While Russians might well be European after some years of reeducation (NATO is NOT the root of all evil, Baltics did NOT join USSR voluntarily), the Russian empire has for 90% of its existence been an agressive danger to Europe and remains so today.
Posted by: Sarmatia | October 23rd, 2007 at 8:06 am | Report this commentIt is true that the West has been insensitive, rude and undiplomatic to Russia, but it is also true that Russia today is ruled by uncouth KGB/army strongman whose aim is to restore the Soviet Union in all but name.
He has succeeded in destroying the civil society and faith in justice for another generation. Russia needs to be contained, as was done during the Cold War.
Senator Stollery,
you are confusing Russia of Russians with the empire of Putin. While Russians might well be European after some years of reeducation (NATO is NOT the root of all evil, Baltics did NOT join USSR voluntarily), the Russian empire has for 90% of its existence been an agressive danger to Europe and remains so today.
Posted by: Sarmatia | October 23rd, 2007 at 8:11 am | Report this commentIt is true that the West has been insensitive, rude and undiplomatic to Russia, but it is also true that Russia today is ruled by uncouth KGB/army strongman whose aim is to restore the Soviet Union in all but name.
He has succeeded in destroying the civil society and faith in justice for another generation. Russia needs to be contained, as was done during the Cold War.
I think it is in Russia’s interest not to plant its feet firmly in either Europe(West) or Asia (East) but instead straddle both worlds as it sits on the great divide, reaping and absorbing the political,economic, and cultural benefits of both west and east…the SCO can and probably will be eventually just as important as the EU…
Posted by: Lisa-Helene Lawson | October 28th, 2007 at 9:51 pm | Report this comment