Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-06-18-Speech-1-154"
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"en.20070618.16.1-154"2
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"Madam President, we are discussing Mrs Quisthoudt-Rowohl’s report at a very difficult time. The Partnership and Cooperation Agreement with Russia is virtually on ice. There are difficult relations between certain Member States and Russia. It is totally unclear what the outcome of the WTO negotiations will be. In this regard, too, there is frustration on many counts. The Free Trade Agreement that should be concluded after Russia’s accession to the WTO is a project that we have been envisaging for a long time but has been put off time and again.
Mr Wiersma and also Mrs Oomen-Ruijten raised an important point, and that is that we are in a strange situation. On the one hand, we are achieving economic integration and are sensing in the Russians an intensity and indeed a willingness to adopt Western standards in the field of investments and production facilities. On the other hand, in the political sphere, something is discernible on the part of Russia that could be described as either uncertainty or a craving for status.
It is good to retain a healthy pragmatism, as Mrs Quisthoudt-Rowohl has done in her report, and to say that we need and want these relations. Russia is our neighbour, it is an important political power, and it will continue to be an important political power in future. We also need it for the internal stability of the European region as a whole. Let us develop sound economic relations, therefore, including in the field of energy cooperation. I believe that this is the right course to take.
Yet we need something more, too, Commissioner, so that there is not always the risk of Russia’s using economic policy as a political weapon. We should develop sound mechanisms to foster genuine dialogue. These are finely tuned in relation to many other countries, in some cases very finely tuned, but in the case of Russia we are still at square one. Dialogue between our respective business communities, SMEs, political cooperation, civil society – all this is necessary for the development of a reliable democracy that does not fear that every conflict situation will immediately turn into a dispute."@en1
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