EASTERN PARTNERSHIP IS A MAJOR SUCCESS STORY

Article by European Union Commissioner for Trade and European Neighbourhood Policy, Benita Ferrero-Waldner
When the Foreign Ministers of the EU and of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine will meet this week to discuss the progress made on the Eastern Partnership they will be able to note that we have come fairly far in a very short time. It wasn`t even a year ago, that I presented the proposal for this policy, based to ideas from several sides including the Polish and Swedish governments. This policy literally had a number of fathers but I am proud to say that I am the mother of this baby that has already grown considerably.
We wanted to create a dedicated policy which accommodates our neighbours" desire to deepen and expand their relations with the EU as well as our EU interest to see stability, good governance and economic development consolidated further in the six partner countries to our East. At the same time I wanted to bolster regional ties between the six partner countries. There is so much that can be done in the region!

Let me say, our baby has done very well and has by now become a nice teenager. Since the founding summit on 7 May in Prague, we have managed to work on both components of the Eastern Partnership - the bilateral and the multilateral tracks.

Bilaterally, we are moving ahead to implement the promise made in the Eastern Partnership which is the offer to negotiate Association Agreements with all partner countries provided the necessary conditions are met. We are working out together how we can intensify and fine-tune our assistance based on the specific needs of your country so these conditions can be fulfilled. Such Association agreements will for instance considerably expand our scope of cooperation and also include far reaching free trade arrangements. While we are already negotiating with Ukraine and will launch the negotiations with Moldova in the beginning of January 2010, we are about to finalize the proposal for negotiation directives for the countries of the Caucasus.

At the same time we have also set ourselves the goal of improving the possibilities for citizens of Azerbaijan to travel to the European Union through first visa facilitation and as a long term goal visa free travel regimes. After all it is through direct contact and seeing for yourself that one can learn the most about each other.

But there is more. On the multilateral track we have started so-called platforms which are dealing with topics of interest for all partners and which are intended to stimulate cooperation with the EU but first and foremost among themselves. All your countries have expressed the wish to develop more intense, deeper relationships with the EU and at the same time each of the six Eastern Partnership countries are at very different stages of their respective reform processes. Therefore, we discuss questions of democracy, good governance and stability; Economic integration; Energy security; and contacts between people in these four platforms. The work programme for the coming two years has been agreed and we are all committed to making these platforms a true forum for exchanging information and best practices. The full participation of Belarus in these multilateral platforms is important as our bilateral relationship remains limited due to the political circumstances.

Tangible results can be expected from joint activities under the flagship initiatives on integrated border management or support to small and medium enterprises for example. We want these initiatives to deliver. Strengthening the fight against corruption brings visible results for citizens and businesses alike. Increased energy efficiency can be seen on the monthly energy bills.

Another angle of our increased joint efforts in the Eastern Partnership is the creation of a Civil Society Forum - again creating a forum for representatives from civil societies in all partnership countries to exchange information, create networks and synergies. A vibrant civil society for me is an essential player in a democratic political system and I was happy to see many representatives assembled during the first meeting of the forum in Brussels three weeks ago.

I am proud of the considerable progress we have achieved so far thanks to the active involvement of all partners. This is promising and until leaving this most important legacy to my successor, I will continue to put my full political weight behind the further growing of this Eastern Partnership which is beneficial to all of us.
Brussels, December 2009