BSEC Is Establishing a Dense Network for Dialogue and Cooperation
Interview with the Secretary General of the BSEC PERMIS H.E. Ambassador Michael B. Christides
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Interview with the Secretary General of the BSEC PERMIS H.E. Ambassador Michael B. Christides
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At a time when Russia has become more assertive to the point of challenging the mainstay of the international order, it helped establish since 1945, and Turkey seeks to maintain the status quo in the realm of maritime security, the European Union struggles to define its foreign policy objectives and priorities towards the Eastern Neighborhood, and thereby show its gravitas. Consequently, the Black Sea region finds itself more divided, unsteady, and uncertain about its future as regional actors such as Ukraine and Georgia have cast aside their balancing acts towards a turn to the EU and NATO with negative territorial implications. Thus, the fluidity of the international order raises doubts as to whether regionalism is a realistic prospect in this region or it needs to be replaced by another model of regional governance.
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The very existence of international regions in post-Soviet space remains one of the central issues of international cooperation as lack of cohesion and collective actions manifested by weak regional institutions remain one of the features of Eurasia even twenty five years after the collapse of the USSR. With ongoing economic recession and rising security challenges, Eurasian nations need closer cooperation with each other more than ever. However, it is not just their reluctance to engage into wide-range regional cooperation that interferes with cooperation efforts. Current rationale of regional integration in Eurasia and the latest history of regionalization take little account of region’s potential and needs. Thus, a shift from already traditional geopolitical regionalization to network-like regionalism is seen as vital for the whole region in order to attain positive dynamics of development at both regional and national levels.
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When newly arising challenges constantly threaten to divert European capitals’ attention from the EU Eastern Partnership (EaP)1, the position of three Baltic States – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – remains unshaken. Such solidarity and assistance to democratic reforms can be compared to one of Nordic states, which invested a great deal into the post-Soviet transformation of the Baltics. However, the Baltic states’ engagement into the EaP region, which often includes criticizing Russia, is more complex than a policy of ‘giving back’. The article takes a closer look into the role the Baltic States play in the EaP region, with particular attention to Ukraine. In addition to estimating the Baltic support, the main aim is to assess the impact that active involvement and transfer of the best reform-related practices to the EaP countries has on the Baltic States. It will also evaluate the hypothesis that the Baltic States’ actions in the EaP region strengthen them as a region.
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The weakening of the US global influence in recent years has led to a formation of geopolitical vacuum in various regions of the World, where old and new regional players are rushing to fill their dominance. This led to regional instability, with which the US is already unable to cope. As a result, the international relations system is undergoing significant deformation toward multipolarity, accompanied by zones of instability, local and regional conflicts and geopolitical faults. One of such examples was the Wider Middle East explosion, manifested by the formation of the Islamic state and the civil war in Syria, which the United States alone are unable to cope with. Consequently, one can witness a loss of confidence in the US coming from the European allies and the destruction of Atlantic solidarity between them.
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This paper analyses the evolution of post-Soviet Russian conceptual and doctrinal visions of conventional deterrence and its current status, prospects and impact on regional and global levels in the framework of Russian strategic military and political thinking. The paper argues that although neglected since the early post-Soviet period, Russian conventional (nonnuclear) deterrence has been revisited especially since 2014 when Russia’s Military Doctrine gave it a new definition, soon applied in practice during the Syrian campaign. In its military strategy, conventional deterrence changed its standing over the last two decades from a subsidiary tactical/sub-strategic level warfighting tool to a separate military-political factor and a self-contained component of Russian strategic deterrence. Against the backdrop of Ukrainian crisis, Syrian conflict and rising tension between Russia and NATO, Russian conventional deterrence fulfills the function of a regional and global military-political factor, while its application in warfighting is now happening on a new, more effective technological level based on new types of long-range precision-guided munitions (PGM).
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Once being annexed by Russia, Crimea with the rest of the Black Sea sub-region immediately broke through the front line of the global post-bipolar geopolitics. The author argues that there is an urgent need to re-estimate the traditional input of the key Black Sea actors. This initial reading suggests Russia, as well as NATO, the USA, the EU, and Turkey finding the new format of protecting their interests due to the new geopolitical challenges and changed military climate in the Black Sea basin.
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The NATO-Russia confrontation as one of New Cold War’s manifestations has direct implications for the independence, sovereignty and national security of Belarus. There is a risk Russia will manage to transform Belarus into its outpost in the New Cold War in order to generate conventional and hybrid threats to NATO states and Ukraine. Kremlin may also destabilize the political and military situation in Belarus if it is decided that President Lukashenko is overcrossing imposed red lines or Moscow is losing control to influence political processes (for example, transit of power).
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The article touches issues of Ukraine-Moldova relations and considers pros and cons of the realism-oriented and liberalism/constructivism-oriented approaches in the bilateral relations. The author argues that liberal constructivist approach will result in win-win results whereas the realism-oriented approach can be counterproductive and thus a task of the civil society is to invigorate governments to make joint efforts grounded on common values instead of behaving using the perspective of rational egoism.
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The article focuses on the on-going conflict in the East of Ukraine. Two years after its beginning, it has become a challenge for both national and regional security. By now, it carries the features of the so-called “frozen” conflicts, typical for post-Soviet political space. Managing these conflicts is specifically difficult due to strong impact of the Russian policy, to which these conflicts are instruments for strengthening control over immediate neighbourhood. On the other hand, the conflict resembles other militarized internal disputes (MIDs) of the post-bipolar world. They encompass numerous issues, including identities, resources, symbols, and narratives. They also often result from structural factors, triggered by weakness of states. Most of these conflicts are hard to manage and/or resolve. So far, there is no defined strategy for Ukraine to apply for settling the conflict. We argue that theoretical guidelines for internal conflict management combined with the critical analysis of similar conflicts’ trajectories could help elaborate a more precise approach.
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The Ukrainian crisis demonstrated that lack of trust between major regional security players like NATO and Russia overshadows most regional disputes and conflicts. The article’s main argument is that problems in the two parties’ relations stem from NATO’s and Russia’s existential search for a new role after the end of the Cold War, when their roles and sets of strategies used to be clearly defined. The clash between NATO’s liberal logic and Russia’s realist logic shows that the two players are acting in different systems of coordinates and the minimal common denominator is still to be found.
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Since its independence, Azerbaijan and the EU maintained relations, which phased development. The EU developed new tools that transformed the form of these relations from purely economic to legal and had to be found within the constraints of integration. However, for the first time, this format of relations development does not suit Azerbaijan; so it is taking an initiative to create the future scenario of cooperation with this organization. This article provides analysis of the perception of Azerbaijan's relations with the EU and the possible reasons for their development.
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Russia’s policy towards Ukraine did not simply change the system of international relations, rebuilding the relations between its key elements. Moscow’s actions in Crimea and eastern Ukraine have urged the need for sub-regional cooperation. Regionalization is one of the key trends in international relations. The author examines factors that stimulated sub-regional cooperation on the European continent (Central and Eastern Europe, South-Eastern Europe, the Black Sea region), the impact of the current global and regional processes on regional interaction, as well as the question of whether the Russian-Ukrainian crisis has raised the issue of a sub-regional security system formation due to a sharper sense of insecurity among states of CEE, SEE and the Black Sea region. The factors that facilitate or hamper efficiency of regional cooperation are studied as well.
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The article examines the political and economic meaning of the EU's Autonomous Trade Measures for Ukraine. The article questions the effectiveness of granting such measures on the political and economic levels and explores its impact on the bilateral trade relations of the European Union and Ukraine.
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This article looks into the variable impact of the global financial crisis of 2008 on the economies of the Black Sea region. In most cases, the impact was swift and negative but short-lived. What pervades the post-crisis environment is an underlying sense of uncertainty. This is a necessary development to a degree, a correction of the recklessness which had become a hallmark of the latter phase of the pre-crisis boom, during which over-leveraging had reached dangerous levels and ultimately unraveled at a high economic and social cost. However, it is a key factor behind sluggish post-crisis investment, reducing observed economic growth rates and potentially suppressing longer-term growth prospects. The article also supports that the variable impact of the crisis has demonstrated the persistent heterogeneity of the Black Sea economies, which is attributable to structural factors. The latter makes the delineation of any region specific strategy for economic growth, or crisis management, difficult.
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In the 21st century, it has become even clearer that political considerations come sooner than economy when global goals and concepts are at stake. Unfortunately, it will be an exaggeration to say that the contemporary globalized world is ruled by markets only. More and more often economy follows political decisions and that brings turmoil into the well-being of even the most developed members of the international community. Number one area of such unbalanced approach is energy, in particular oil and gas.
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In this article, we argue that Russia’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine generates far-reaching consequences for both regional and global security. On the one hand, Russia appears as a revisionist state, which is challenging the existing world order, incompatible with an Anschluss. On the other hand, Russia’s capabilities of projecting power are limited mostly to its neighbourhood. Russia’s neighbours will be destabilized most, while the European security architecture will undergo large-scale transformations. At the same time, Russian revisionism is also threatening normative and conceptual foundations of the global security arrangements. Principles of state sovereignty, non-use of force, as well as nonproliferation regime are damaged – and that will surely produce long-term consequences on the global scale.
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The article offers analysis of Russia’s military strategy based on the text of the Military Doctrine 2014 as well as the Kremlin’s public rhetoric. The issues of Russia’s identity as well as its vital interests and military development and engineering are touched upon. On the other hand, the United States’ National Security Strategy 2015 is regarded as a key element to understanding American intentions and resolve in response to the Russia’s challenge. The Ukrainian conflict is presented as a key element of Russia’s strategy.
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The article examines interdependence between values and security, as well as the ability of the existing international system and its actors to ensure protection of democratic values and thus security. The article raises questions of need for new international mechanisms for security protection. The problem of competition between state-centrism and human security concepts is examined through Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and the international system’s inability to protect basic principles of international law and ensure peace.
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he Ukrainian crisis definitely did not make the South Caucasus a safer place. Armenia’s dependence on Russia was exposed further, while Georgian-Ukrainian official relations suffered because of the Georgian authorities’ passiveness and the Saakashvili factor. All of the South Caucasus countries, and especially Georgia and Azerbaijan, felt uneasy with the annexation of Crimea perceived as an unprecedented violation of the territorial integrity principle. Russia, while engaged in Eastern Ukraine, has somehow distracted itself from the South Caucasus but it still keeps enough presence to maintain the current status quo and influence key developments. The Western sanctions, having badly hit the Russian economy, are indirectly affecting the South Caucasus too, especially Armenia and Georgia.
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