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EU needs mutual trust with Russia – Italian FM
Published: 08 December, 2009, 12:04
Edited: 27 December, 2009, 17:24
TAGS: Military, NATO, EU, Russia, Politics
Italy trusts the Russian Federation and its government, but it needs to spread knowledge about Russia to promote confidence and trust, believes Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini in an exclusive interview to RT.
Dmitry Medvedev’s proposal about the Treaty on Joint European Security that would make Russia an indivisible part of it is a good one, says Franco Frattini, and it should be discussed with an “open minded approach.”
“I do not consider the proposal or treaty put on the table by the President of Russian Federation as an alternative to NATO, which remains a pillar for Euro-Atlantic security and cooperation,” Frattini noted.
“The EU is a global player,” he added. “How is it possible to forget that its biggest and most important neighbour is the Russian Federation? That is why I am quite optimistic – our discussion will continue in the future.”
Speaking about the possible creation of a joint European army, Franco Frattini said that “If we had a European army instead of having 27 national armies, we would have been better in rapidly responding to the requests of the US and NATO.”
He added that “There is no contradiction. On the contrary, there will be integration between NATO and the future European Army operating with NATO.”
He also said that it is in Russia’s interest to deal with a fully integrated Europe.
Franco Frattini said that the Russian-led gas project South Stream is not an alternative to the Nabucco project.
“We support the South Stream because it will be ready and operational much earlier than Nabucco’s infrastructure, but we are not against it. The problem is who will be providing gas for Nabucco.”
Franco Frattini expressed hope that, probably in 2010, there would be a proposal made by a country like Italy to make a visa-free regime with the Russian Federation. So far, any of the 27 EU members can veto such a proposal, but in the future it will no longer be possible when the matter is submitted to a qualified majority vote.
“I am sure there will be enough of a majority to get a visa-free regime for Russians in 2010,” concluded Italian Foreign Minister.
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To Sarah, Part 1: I’m unsure why you emphasize to me the political immorality of the West. In doing so, I assure you that you’re preaching to the converted. I simply point out that Russia’s record is even worse. You compare Finland and Estonia in the context of WW2. The comparison is invalid because (1) Finland was not attacked by Russia for the purpose of extinguishing it from the list of sovereign nations, like Estonia was. Russia “merely” wanted some Finnish territory. Nor did Russia instigate an indiscriminate terror campaign against Finish civilians, as it did in Estonia. These factors would immediately, and legitimately, inspire a different attitude towards Russia in Estonia than in Finland. (2) Because Finland is geographically amongst the largest of European nations, it can afford to absorb an invasion, regroup, and push hopefully push it back. Estonia’s small size and lack of natural barriers makes this very much harder. Therefore it is in Estonia’s interest to try to keep enemy front lines as far away from its borders as possible. (3) At no time did Estonians fight for Hitler’s war aims. Hitler promised to destroy the Estonian nation no less than the Soviets. Estonians knew that Germany would lose the war, and the sooner the better. Their aim was to try to keep Soviet forces as far from Estonia’s borders as possible when the inevitable German defeat came, so as to avoid Moscow re-establishing its murderous occupation of 1940-41. That hope was disappointed, Soviet occupation was re-imposed, and continued for almost 50 more years. I’ll continue my response to your post in Part 2.
To Sarah Part 2: Estonian does not want to annoy Russia, but to defend its own interests. You claim “Estonia treats Russian minorities badly.” No it does not. It provides full citizenship by standard naturalization whose requirements are the same as apply in any country. So far about 110,000 people have acquired citizenship by this means. About 94,000 Russian citizens also live in Estonia, and about 104,000 people who have applied for no citizenship at all. Exactly the same social services and benefits are available to all, and non-citizens can even vote in local elections. What bothers Moscow is, that the hundreds of thousands of colonists it brought in during the Soviet era for the purpose of Russifying the country, turning the native population into a minority in their own land thus guaranteeing the permanent destruction of the Estonian nation, are not granted automatic citizenship. This is because it implies that Soviet rule in the country and Russian colonization of it was not legitimate. Estonia could not afford to give automatic citizenship to foreigners comprising nearly 40% of the population who frankly cared nothing about the country, knew almost nothing about it, did not speak the language, and considered themselves the colonial master race in what they thought of as a province of Russia. Estonia’s aim has been to integrate them within the country, and on balance it has done this very well. The alternative would be for Estonia to culturally and eventually politically literally become a province of Russia, and this is not an option. Moscow’s actions are inconsistent with a supposed wish on its part to establish good relations with Estonia. It seems to suit Russia to have a contrived, yet entirely non-dangerous enemy on its border to divert attention from domestic issues, to sow discord in European institutions and to use as a bit of a punching bag.
Russia would be foolish to trust Western Europe and USA given the history of the last 200 years with 2 invasions of Russia by Western Europe in 130 years and USA suffers from delusions of grandeur about the state of its own affairs. I usually support USA but in recent years I wonder about their role in Eastern Europe, which is a long way from USA and is Russia's "backyard". No good will come of USA's meddling in Eastern Europe..