Chapter 12 - A Europe Divided by Russia?: The New Eastern Member States and the EU's Policy towards the East

Summary

Introduction

Nowhere else is the impact of the Eastern enlargement on the European Union (EU)' s foreign and security policy felt as strongly as in relations with Russia and the other Eastern neighbours of the Union. On the eve of enlargement, it was the Atlanticism of the incoming member states that caused most concern among many old EU countries. However, the fear that the new member states would act as ‘ Trojan horses of the US and put a brake on the development of the European foreign, security and defence policy seems to have been unfounded. The same cannot be said about another major concern of the old member states: they were right to assume that the new Eastern members were going to complicate relations between the EU and Russia by bringing the burden of history and their own problems in relations with the Eastern neighbour to the Union’ s table. The new member states on their behalf were hoping that EU membership would have a positive impact on their relations with Russia. They had also been expecting the EU to move towards a more unified and consistent Russia policy. Yet neither Russia nor the EU have lived up to their expectations: during the first one-and-a-half years of EU membership, (the time covered by this chapter), their relations with Russia developed in a negative rather than positive direction, and the EU still lacks a coherent policy towards Russia that would help to address the concerns of its Eastern members.