Støre not present in sauna talks
OPINION: Norway’s Foreign Minister will not participate when EU’s foreign affairs chief and seven European Foreign Ministers today meet for informal talks about EU’s neighbourhood policy at the remote ski-resort Saariselkä in Finnish Lapland, just some few kilometres from the border to Russia in the north.
We are sure Norway’s Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre would like to be in Saariselkä this weekend. Not just because the ski tracks in the surrounding pine forest at the resort are extraordinary beautiful this time of the year – the minister is a well-trained skier – but firstly because he has good knowledge to contribute with when discussing European neighbourhood policy. Secondly, the results of the talks – although said to be informal – will affect Norway’s foreign policy and the relations with Russia.
In the Barents Region, and especially in northern Finland, people use to go to the sauna for informal talks when they have serious unsolved challenges. In Saariselkä you will not find one single log cabin, house or hotel without at least one sauna. Maybe that is why Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb chose Saariselkä when he invited the prominent guests to come to Finland for talks about EU’s Foreign Policy?
Many of the needed discussions to be raised regarding EU’s foreign policy is most convenient to take informally before they are put on any official agenda at a podium in Brussels or any other European capital.
A stronger common EU foreign policy is something new. The post as High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of the European Union was created only three months ago. Catherine Ashton was appointed to the post. Ashton comes to Saariselkä this weekend and she does not have any roadmap for EU’s future foreign policy in her luggage when she lands at the cosy little airport in Ivalo, far north of the Arctic Circle.
To make the political discussions even more informal – and cosy – the Foreign Ministers are invited with their accompanying families.
Norway is not a member of the European Union. And Støre is this weekend not among the prominent European Foreign Ministers that meets in the northernmost corner of the European Union to shape the future relations and priorities with neighbouring countries like Russia.
The group of Foreign Ministers that will have informal European security- and policy discussions in the sauna, around the camp fire, or in the ski tracks in Finnish Lapland this weekend are Bernard Kouchner from France, Franco Frattini from Italy, Urmas Paet from Estonia, Miguel Moratinos from Spain, Carl Bildt from Sweden and Alexander Stubb from Finland. In addition are the EU foreign chief Catherine Ashton and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu from Turkey. The last invited to discuss Turkey’s somewhat important role as a neighbouring country and possible future member of EU.
On Thursday this week, the Norwegian Foreign Minister met with his Nordic counterparts in Copenhagen and discussed cooperation within fields like common security- and foreign policy. And yes, small Nordic countries talking joint security makes sense. But it must have been with a strange feeling that Jonas Gahr Støre said bye-bye to Carl Bildt and Alexander Stubb at the airport in Copenhagen Thursday afternoon, knowing that they were heading towards the Barents Region to discuss the same issues, but with bigger partners with bigger tools.
Støre himself was invited, but had to go back to Oslo to participate in the domestic governmental budget talks.
Saariselkä is located only some few kilometres from Finland’s border to Russia in the north. We guess cross-border issues and policy linked with EU’s Russian approach will be high up on the agenda. One issue is for sure the time-frame for introducing visa-free travel between the EU’s Schengen area and Russia.
The “hot” visa issue is at least something both Finland’s Aleksander Stubb and Sweden’s Carl Bildt have in fresh mind. Both of them met with top-officials in Moscow earlier this week. On Monday Stubb had visa-freedom as the main topic on his meeting with Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. – We want visa freedom with Russia, Stubb told journalists after the meeting, as we reported here in BarentsObserver. Russia is not the obstacle for introducing visa freedom. – We are ready to introduce visa-freedom with EU tomorrow, Lavrov responded to the question. The challenge is to convince some few of the other EU member states that visa-freedom with Russia is a good idea. There must be consensus among all 27 member states in issues regarding EU’s Foreign Policy.
Sweden’s Carl Bildt met with both Lavrov and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Tuesday. The Swedish-Russian relations are now getting better after a period of rather chilly diplomatic contacts. It all became better when Sweden last autumn held the Presidency of the European Union. First, Bildt travelled to Murmansk together with BarentsObserver in October. In Murmansk, Bildt took over the chair of the Barents Euro-Arctic Council from Russia for the next two years period and talked about the importance of easing the visa-regulations hampering the contacts between ordinary people within the Barents Region. Then, Sweden received Russia’s President Dmitri Medvedev at the Russian-EU summit in Stockholm. Also here, visa-freedom between the two parties was high up on the agenda.
Staying a three-day weekend in Saariselkä is a long time for busy ministers. They will have time to look around. If they take a closer look at the parking lots, the ministers will see why Alexander Stubb wants to rush the visa-freedom with Russia. Most big SUV’s at the ski resort have Russian registration plates. Tourists from the Russian part of the Barents Region are important for local business. In southern Finland the border-crossing Russians are even more important since more people lives in the areas close to Finland. The city of St. Petersburg is some few hours’ drive from Helsinki and has the same number of inhabitants as the entire Finland; five million people. Obtaining a visa to the Schengen-area is a bureaucratic and time-consuming process. Remove the demand for visa and business will go even better.
This is also what other European countries see. Why else should Spain push for visa freedom with Russia, if it wasn’t for all Russian tourists coming to Costa del Sol? And Italy, where Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi years ago was the first European leader to state that he wanted the EU-Russian visa regime to be scrapped.
And here is maybe the most important common interest BarentsObserver sees among the EU Foreign Ministers meeting in Saariselkä: Finland, Italy, France, Spain, Estonia and Sweden are the EU member states most positive-minded to introduce visa-freedom with Russia. Also Turkey has something to contribute with since the country are in direct negotiations with Russia and hopes to get a deal with Russia scrapping visa demands later this year.
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“ BarentsObserver support visa-freedom between Russia and the European Union. For us the question is simple. Visa-freedom means more travel and more contacts and by that more cross-border knowledge and cultural respect between east and west. That’s what we call soft security – building a common security platform in Europe based on people-to-people contacts. “
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To facilitate such east-west contacts was the cornerstone when the frame for the Barents cooperation was drawn in 1993. We consider the coming visa-freedom as Part-II of the Barents cooperation.
Visa-freedom will also make it easier to establish inter-connected business and by that strengthen the ties between the growing Russian economy and a EU that is political strong enough to link its economical cooperation with Russia with respect for democracy, environment and human rights.
Although Norway is not a member of EU, the country participates in the Schengen Agreement, making it possible for Norwegians to travel without passports within the agreement’s member states. But the Norwegian’s are not participating when EU is forming its new visa regime with Russia, and by that creating an important cornerstone in the new security platform in Europe.
That is a pity.
Thomas Nilsen
Editor - BarentsObserver