It has happened. The coming Summit of EU-Russia that will be held 26-27 June is likely to be called historic. It’s not only because it will be the first participation by President Dmitry Medvedev, but also because talks on the new basic partnership agreement will start officially between Russia and united Europe.    

On Monday the EU Council of Ministers approved of the long-suffering directive authorizing the Brussels’ apparatus to carry out talks with Moscow about the new legal basis of relations. 

The current agreement, signed in 1994 and effective since 1997, got out of date long ago, which is admitted by both sides. Not only the EU and Russia have changed much, but also the new times have come to the world. It was arranged about necessity of the new agreement in 2005. Russia featured with vertical of power enabling it to start talks at any moment, EU is a consensus of the 27 states. The new members turned out to be restive and biased towards Russia, due to some historically caused reasons. Poland blocked the talks for almost two years striving for withdrawal by Moscow of embargo for Polish meat. And Lithuania has also been hindering the process during recent months.         

The well-informed sources in the EU told to Novaya Gazeta that the directive had been ready for long and the only obstacle was objections by Vilnius. They were reduced to two points. The first one is the energy issue, in particular, renewal of suspended in 2006 oil supplies through “Druzhba” pipe-line to the only in Lithuania Majeiskyai oil-processing plant. In more general terms this is about observing by Russia the signed but not ratified Agreement To The Energy Charter. The second requirement is more active actions by Russia for settling the “frozen” conflicts in Moldavia and Georgia. 

To make Lithuanians to withdraw the veto it took to mention in the directive’s text that the EU Council and the European Commission take into account the concern with a long-term interruptions of supplies through the “Druzhba” pipe-line; they also call Russia to active cooperation and they will make a priority of the oil supplies by Russia to Lithuania in the future. The Lithuanians were assured they wouldn’t be left facing the problem alone.  

Same was done about the frozen conflicts. Lithuanians said they wanted to take the opportunity to make a pressure on Russia so that to settle problems of Georgia and Moldavia. However, other EU members objected, saying it would be unwise to drive oneself at the deadlock with the statements like “no solution for Transdniestria, no EU-Russia agreement”.    

The directive was arranged a week ago at the Committee of the residing representatives of the EU members in Brussels. So on Monday the ministers were only to confirm that decision, without any discussion held.  

A range of topics for the talks has been designed in the document mentioned. It starts with set of issues related to international security. The EU sets the goal to enlarge the cooperation with Russia in the “common neighborhood zone” – that’s Ukraine, Moldavia, Byelorussia and South Caucasus. Now it is considered to be not “the near abroad” of Russia, but common neighbors equally interesting to the EU.     

The EU wants to improve cooperation regarding struggle against terrorism, spread of mass destruction weapons, to strengthen control over export of arms, to develop cooperation between emergency agencies.

Then follows a big section dedicated to trade and economic cooperation. The EU approves of the progress by Russia on her way to WTO. It considers the cooperation should be concretized in the aspect of phyto-sanitary norms, access to the state orders, and protection of the intellectual property. The list starts with energy, customs and tariffs, banking sphere, tourism and agriculture. Then goes the part dealing with security matters, justice and freedoms. This part is promising in terms of possible abolition of having to get visas for the trips by our citizens.    

Next part is about culture, education and science. Then the document says about obligations written in the bilateral agreements between the EU countries and Russia. That’s the sore point for many EU members, as some “large” and “old” EU members have their own privileged contacts with the Kremlin, which often prevents Europe to deal with Russia as a united front. “Without statement about the energy it would have been difficult to get approval by a number of EU countries concerned with reliability of Russian supplies of energy carriers” noted an EU official. Brussels wants clear and transparent rules of the game from Russia, and the equal mutual access to the energy markets.   

No one can forecast how long the talks will be going on. It seems to be long as the questions on the agenda are very complicated. 

No time limitation is set for talks with Russia. “The sooner the new agreement is signed and ratified, the sooner EU and Russia establish the relations of the 21st century” assure the European sources.  

The ready agreement will have to be ratified by the parliaments of the EU countries, the European Parliament and the Russian Federal Assembly. However, a very important part from there may come into effect without ratification. That’s about trade-economic part that relates to the EU and not to inter-government competence of the EU members. It comes into effect automatically one month after signing the agreement.     

“If Russia accepts the mandate for talks in the suggested form - and we are hoping for that - then the talks’ agenda will also include a section about developing cooperation in the sphere of democracy and human rights” said Christine Gallack, the assistant to the EU senior representative Javier Solana, to a Novaya Gazeta correspondent.  “The agreement must be based on the fact that we and Russians have same foundations, respect for personal liberty above all. That’s our starting point.”