What I have learnt on 25.04.2007:
i. Steinmeier’s sentence: ‘President Yeltsin turned his eyes towards Europe and opened Russia to the world’
ii. EU-Troika is, I guess, three ministers of the EU:
1) German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter STEINMEIER
2) EU High Representative Javier SOLANA,
3) EU Commissioner for External Relations Benita FERRERO-WALDNER.
In the web-site of ministry of foreign affairs of Germany this is as follows:Die EU-Troika – bestehend aus Bundesaußenminister Dr. Frank-Walter Steinmeier als Vertreter der deutschen EU-Ratspräsidentschaft, dem Hohen Repräsentanten der EU für die Gemeinsame Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik, Dr. Javier Solana, und EU-Kommissar Olli Rehn
iii. The new EU Central Asia strategy is going to cover following areas:
- rule of law, human rights, democratization
- education
- energy and transport
- environment
- trade and economic cooperation
- regional security: border protection, drug-trafficking, and organized crime
- EU Council Minister, Steinmeier calls this a “farsighted security policy”
iv. There is such a term/concept as Middle East Quartet which is comprised of EU, UN, US, Russia, none of which situate in Middle East, well except for UN, it is worldwide. This is a strange way of cooperation of states and international organizations, well UN and the some other powers. Wiki says it’s a foursome of nations and international and supranational entities involved in mediating the peace process in Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I wonder why they have no non-western organization or state there, some representatives of Arab world would diversify this Quartet and make it more credible.
v. Gulf Cooperation Council or also Cooperation Council for the Arab states of the Gulf, comprises Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. It is a trade bloc which was created in 1981.
Among the stated objectives are:
· formulating similar regulations in various fields such as economy, finance, trade, customs, tourism, legislation, and administration;
· fostering scientific and technical progress in industry, mining, agriculture, water and animal resources;
· establishing scientific research centres;
· setting up joint ventures;
· encouraging cooperation of the private sector;
· strengthening ties between their peoples; and
· establishing a common currency by 2010, the Khaleeji.
vi. Viktor Ivanov is an Aide to the President of the Russian Federation, Rashid Nurgaliyev is an interior Minister. Well some ministers of US, EU and Russia met in Berlin in the beginning of march to talk about border management, drugs, situation in Afghanistan and terrorism again without any of the states which are situated in the region, I mean Pakistan, iran, Central Asian states, because it is their borders which have to be managed, because they have immediate borders with Afghanistan.
1) The following sentence is funny: terrorism and organized crime have become global phenomena which affect the US, Russia and the EU alike. Isn’t is ridiculous? These are the less affected states. There is Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and I am sure many more states in the world which have stronger affects of both terrorism and bloody fight against terrorism. US is fighting against terrorism on the territories of other sovereignties violating the latter. All right, I am too emotional now. Have to stop winging.
2) Secretary Chertoff (US) says “terrorists have networks, so should we. There is no doubt about the ambition of terrorists” – is there really? Does really anyone know about the ambitions of terrorists? Have there been serious researches on the nature of terrorism? I think the biggest mistake of many states and international organizations is the tendency to dehumanize terrorists, talking of them as of creatures, evils, non-humans, by labeling them like this we delve into ignorance and will never know why terrorism exists and what provokes those young people to blow up themselves and the others. I agree this isn’t the nice thing to do, this is something scary, but by demonizing this phenomenon and putting too much moral value in that we will never come up with the solution. What is this fight against terrorism? At the end of the day, my impression is, that it is just an attempt to annihilate them, bomb them, destroy infrastructure, civilians’ households, lives… and many more. Has there been any program on how to measure success in war against terrorism? Was it studies enough to know how to fight it? And who to fight? Most of the organizations don’t have a proper definition of terrorism. Various states have various lists of terrorist organizations.
3) Ivanov says terrorists and their supporters need to be brought to justice, what is it? How is it done? Does it mean being tortured? Killed? Or imprisoned for lifelong terms? Does it mean bringing to justice?
vii. Just read quite an optimistic article on Berlin’s new Central Asia text to EU diplomats. The text is 10-pages long, written by German foreign ministry. Didn’t find the text though.
1) Lower political level: regular human rights dialogue and energy dialogue on a bilateral basis. There are plans to open European Commission office in each of the local capitals; greater EU visibility, specific EU presence in Dushanbe; opening of the European Studies Institute in the region is also foreseen.
2) Brussels aims to parachute in ‘judicial and administrative experts’ to help clean the corrupt CA bureaucracies and court systems, while seconding CA officials and businessman to EU administrations and corporations; Erasmus Mundus for students;
3) 750 million Euro aid package on new roads, and water management projects; draft new commercial legislation to steer the states toward WTO accession
4) Future human-rights dialogues will be result-oriented; help build civil society and independent media – e-silk-highway – internet access; support create trade unions
