Relations of Moldova with European Union

EUROPEAN UNION: STRUCTURE & INSTITUTIONS

INSTRUCTOR: . STUDENT: Janku M.

Table of Contents

June 16, 2011

History Background ................................ ................................ ................................ ............................ 2

Moldova s independence ................................ ................................ ................................ ................ 3

Relations with the European Union ................................ ................................ .......................... 3

EU Member states position versus Moldova ................................ ................................ ....... 8

Current relations ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ 10

What s next? ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ ......... 11

Conclusion ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ .............. 13

References ................................. ................................ ................................ ................................ ............. 14

History Background
The Republic of Moldova or Moldova, as is well known, is a country located between Romania from the west and Ukraine to the east. Its borders with Romania bounded by the flow of the rivers Prut and lower Danube. He was a member of the Soviet Union from 1945 to 1991 as the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic. Declared its independence on August 27, 1991. The total area is 33,843 sq. km2 and its population mainly populated by Romanians, based on estimates of 2009, is 4,320,748 inhabitants. In antiquity the region of Moldova is inhabited by the tribe of Dacians. Because of its strategic position as a crossroads between Asia and Europe, Moldova has seen many invaders, including the Kiev Rus and the Mongols. The raids by Tatars continued after the founding of the principality . The three Principalities Transylvania, Moldavia and Wallachia existed in the years around 1600. In the middle Ages most of the current Republic of Moldova was the principality of Moldova was founded in 1359. The principality became tributary to the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century. The Treaty of Bucharest in 1812, was annexed to Russia as Bessarabia. The western part of Moldavia remained an autonomous principality and united with Vallachia to create in 1859 the Kingdom of Romania.At the end of World War II, Bessarabia declared its independence from Russia in 1918 and joined the same year as the Kingdom of Romania.The agreement Molotov- Ribbentrop Pact between Russia and Germany, the Russians occupied Bessarabia in June 1940, were expelled again in 1941 until August 1944 when the area was retaken by Soviet troops. The country is renamed the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic. During Stalin's many Russians moved into the country particularly in urban areas, while many Romanians were deported to Siberia and Kazakhstan.

Moldova s independence
Moldova used to be the third richest region of the Soviet Union, obtained its independence in 1991 and in after 20 years managed to become one of the poorest countries in Europe. After the breakup of Soviet Union in 1991, Moldova had to face a new reality. In 1990, five Moldovan regions with less than one million people, located on the left side of river Nistru, declared their independence. Many tensions between the Moldovan government and the breakaway Transnistria Republic escalated into a military conflict that started in March 1992 and was concluded by a ceasefire in July 1992. Any member of the United Nations does not recognize Transnistria s sovereignty and it has no official diplomatic relations with any of those states. However, Russia is great supporter of Transnistria and other self-declared independent territories of the former Soviet Union countries (Abhazia, South Osetia). Transnistria accounts for 40% of Moldovan GDP, the main part of the Moldovan industry is located on the left side of the Nistru, and therefore it is a strategic region for Moldova. Transnistria is still under the control of Russian Army, which constitutes a serious violation of International Public Law and of the 1999 Istanbul Agreements. On July 8, 2004, the European Court of Human Rights stated in a ruling that the Russian army "stationed in Moldovan territory in breach of the undertakings to withdraw them completely given by Russia at the OSCE summits in 1999 and 2001." Even with domestic conflicts and tensions, Moldova had to establish its state institutions and undertake a complex process of social and economic reforms. Moldova established its diplomatic relations with other countries and organizations, including European Union. Despite the relative short period of cooperation between Moldova and EU, striking ups and downs marked these relations.

Relations with the European Union

After the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, Moldova found itself in a totally new reality. Along with the establishment of its state institutions and with undertaking a complex process of reforms, the Republic of Moldova also had to redefine its relations with the external world. On the other side, the external 3

actors had also to adapt themselves to the new international architecture, brought by the dissolution of the USSR. The European Community (EC) was not an exception in this sense. In addition to establishing the new diplomatic relations with the former soviet republics, the EC committed itself to support their political and economic transformation. The EC TACIS (Technical Assistance for the Commonwealth of Independent States) program became the main instrument, which aimed at enhancing the transition process in all former soviet republics, except the Baltic States. When TACIS was initiated in 1991, the technical assistance through this program was a stand-alone activity. Later it became part of a more complex policy approach of the European Union (EU) towards countries in Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia, due to gradual development and formalization of their bilateral relations through new legal frameworks Partnership and Co-operation Agreements (PCAs).The EUMoldova PCA was signed in November 1994. While this framework agreement was passing through a cumbersome ratification procedure by the EU member states, Moldovan President PetruLucinschi expressed by successive official letters addressed to the President of the European Commission and to all EU heads of states and governments the aspiration of Moldova to become an associate member of the EU. Though no formal answer followed, through different channels it was suggested that before passing to the association stage a full implementation of the EU-Moldova PCA was necessary. With entering into force of the EU- Moldova PCA in July 1998 the first period (1991-1998) of EUMoldova co-operation process came to an end. In contrast with the first period which was more wait and see in its nature, in the second period (1998-2005) the relationship between the EU and Moldova gained more consistency. This was largely due to the EU-Moldova PCA, which established a formal contractual relationship between parties concerned and set out a co-operation framework in abroad spectrum of policy areas. The second period was also marked by striking ups and downs in the approach Moldovan authorities have deployed concerning European integration course. In this regard, the Sturza government (March December 1999), appointed by the ruling parliamentary coalition Alliance for Democracy and Reforms (ADR),

increased salience of European integration for Moldova. Both at the level of programs and in practical levels, the Sturza Cabinet made more efforts than previous governments in bringing Moldova closer to the EU. However, due to the frictions inside the ADR, the Sturza government was shortly dismissed, as a result of which European integration course of Moldova slowed down. Only after a three-year period of incoherent foreign policy did the European dimension of Moldova s foreign policy start to come back gradually t o the top of its external relations agenda. At the time, this return to the pro-EU rhetoric was considered quite surprising. It can be attributed to the establishment of the National Commission for European Integration (NCEI), by the President Vladimir Voronin, in November 2002. The Commission was established with the aim of elaborating the European Integration Strategy of the Republic of Moldova. Later the establishment of some further institutions came to add credibility to the reorientation in the field of external relations, and also led to their hard-gained acceptance by the ruling Party of Communists. Such institutions included the establishment of the special parliamentary Commission for European Integration; setting up the European Integration Department (EID) within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA); approval of the Concept for the Integration of the Republic of Moldova into the EU; and establishment of ministerial and departmental subdivisions in charge of European affairs.At the same time the EU, preparing itself for its big-bang enlargement to the East and South, was showing an increasing interest in the development of a new policy approach towards its future neighbours. Few days after its fifth enlargement wave in May 2004, the EU launched the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP ), which articulates a revised policy approach towards sixteen countries in the EU neighbourhood, Moldova being among them. The ENP was nothing else than a response to the extension of the EU s borders and to the limits of this extension. The EU has designed under the ENP the concept of Action Plans, as main vehicles for taking forward the relationships with its neighbours. The EU-Moldova Action Plan (EUMAP) was negotiated throughout 2004 and was signed in February 2005. This marks the start of the third period (2005-present) of relationsbetween Moldova and the EU. In contrast to the previous period,

defined by ups and downs in the EU -Moldova relations and at best by moderate results in implementing the EU-Moldova PCA, in the third period relations between parties proved evidence of being more consistent and on an ascendant trend. The Potemkin village hypothesis with regard to EUMAP s impact proved wrong. The ENP and the Action Plan brought new dynamics in the relatio ns between the EU and Moldova; extended their co-operation opportunities; specified and detailed co-operation process between parties; updated the areas of dialogue; contributed to a more operational, visible and participative EU s engagement in Moldova; added more elements of conditionality with regard to political dialogue and reform; increased the volume of EU financial assistance; and brought Moldova into a different spatial perspective based on the European neighbourhood and proximity concepts. However, this is not to say that everything went smooth in the implementation process of EUMAP. While performing quite well on the economic dimension of the document, Moldovan authorities proved an obvious lack of administrative capacities and unwillingness to promote fully-fledged reforms in crucial areas such as respect for human rights, freedom of the media, the rule of law, fight against corruption and business environment. These are the five sensitive areas that the monitoring reports of the European Commission and civil society representatives found as most pressing problems to be addressed more seriously in the coming period. Unsurprisingly, in some of the above areas reforms were minor particularly because the push for more radical changes has been perceived as threatening the ruling Party of Communists grip on power. Having in mind the low speed of political reforms in the period of the 2007 local election campaign and the upcoming parliamentarian elections in 2009, substantial progresses in some of the above mentioned sensitive areas are hardly likely in the short run. In addition, 76.2 per cent of Moldovan citizens, as shown by BPO, were favouring European integration, which in comparative terms exceeds the number of Ukrainians who were pleading the same cause while asked about the EU-Ukraine future relationships and even the number of proponents of European integration from some of the Central European countries before their accession to the EU. The trends in Moldovan public opinion are congruent with the patterns of EU

public opinion, that is, younger and more educated people with better living standards tend to be more pro-European. The next period of Moldova-EU relations is directly linked to the events of April 2009 and the so-called twitter revolution . On April 5th, 2010 in Moldova were held the Parliamentary elections. For the 3rd time in a row the Communist Party won the elections with 49, 48 %. The opposition parties and civil society organization accused the Communist Party that they rigged the elections. On 6th and 7th of April, 2009, around 30000 people went into streets to protest against the results of the elections, the number quickly increased due in large part to new technologies and social networks likeFacebook, Twitter, etc. A large group of protesters stormed the Parliament and the Presidential Palace vandalizing both buildings and leaving the Parliament in flame. The Government reaction to the storms was severe, thousands of students were arrested and there were credible reports about mistreatment and torture of detainees, three fatalities were reported in connections with demonstrations and detentions. However, the Communist Party lacked one vote to elect the President and in July 2009 new Parliamentary elections were held. A new government formed by a fragile alliance of liberals and centrist was established after the elections. There was no coincidence in naming the coalition the Alliance for European Integration. These events brought Moldova back on the EU agenda; the new government s tarted a diplomatic offensive to charm EU capitals and created high expectation in Moldova, especially for the educated, young electorate which tends to see the EU as an opportunity to bypass isolation and poverty. The events in Moldova coincided with the launching of EU Eastern Partnership - an institutionalized forum for discussing visa agreements, free trade deals and strategic partnership agreements with the EU's Eastern neighbors, while avoiding the controversial topic of accession to EU. Amon g the main provisions of the Eastern Partnership: new association agreements including deep and comprehensive free trade agreements, for those willing and ready to take on the far-reaching commitments with the EU that these entail; a conclusion of mobility and security pacts , allowing for easier legitimate travel to the EU while at the same time stepping up efforts to combat corruption,

organized crime and illegal migration. These pacts would also cover the upgrading asylum systems to EU standards and the establishment of integrated border management structures, etc. The ultimate long term goal would be full visa liberalization, on a case by case basis, provided that conditions for wellmanaged and secure mobility are in place; the Commission will study possibilities for labor mobility with aim of further opening of the EU labor market; enhanced energy security in the partner countries themselves and with the European Union, including through support to investment in infrastructure, better regulation, energy efficiency and more efficient early warning systems to prevent disruption of supply; enhanced cooperation on environment and climate issues, etc. The new Government quickly engaged the country on the pro -European way. The Government gathered support for a new and very ambitious project, called Rethink Moldova . The EU, USA, IMF, WB and various EU member states took part in this action and in total $ 2,6 billion are scheduled to help Moldova for 2011-2013. In 2010, the financial assistance from th e international organization increased 4 times.

EU Member states position versus Moldova

Unconditional and active supporter of Moldova is Romania that traditionally supported a membership perspective, even when Bucharest had cold relations with former Moldovan Communist Government. Bilateral agreements were signed for agriculture, environment, education, in which Romania will offer assistance to fulfill EU criteria. Other supporters were Poland, Sweden, Hungary, Baltic States and Bulgaria. Those countries were that offered a support for Moldova s EU ambitions, although fully aware that this was not a short -term option. Further more, reluctant supporters were Czech Republic and UK who also opened for discussing for EU membership if some other MSs would put the issue on the table. Both reluctant on visa also. On the same way, Germany had good willing skeptics with a high level contact between Chisinau and Berlin brought encouragements, but Germany also expects substantial reforms before

any discussion on membership. On the other hand France, Spain, Italy and Netherland had indifferent skeptics without any clear position on Moldova. It seems not to be on their agenda. Italy is positive on visas. Netherland seems to focus on human rights and minorities treatment. While also Belgium, Denmark, Luxembourg had an indifferent position but positive to visa skeptics. The unconditional supporter of Moldova Europeanization is Romania. On November 13th, 2009, Moldova signed the Agreement on Small -Scale border traffic with Romania, which went into effect on February 25th, 2010. The Agreement permits people who have been residents in the border area of either country for at least a year, to travel in the neighboring state s border zone without a visa, for 3 months. Another achievement of the pro -European Government from Chisinau is the beginning of negotiations for the Ass ociation Agreement and Deep and Comprehensive Trade Agreement with EU. There were four rounds of negotiations in 2010. Currently, Moldova and EU negotiations focus on four working groups addressing issues that relate to foreign policy, security, justice and economic cooperation. Regarding the economic cooperation were closed already 18 of the 22 chapters, which have been negotiated. After the last negotiations held in October 2010, Gunnar Wiegand, the head of EU delegation, Director for Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia, mentioned that: This year [2010] has been enormous progress in EU Moldova relations . The European official said that after the conclusion of the fourth round of negotiations, the EU will provide some key recommendations for Moldova, concerning the creation of free trade area. After Russia imposed the second embargo on Moldovan wine in 2010, which had catastrophically consequences for Moldovan wine industry (which constitutes 25 % of Moldovan GDP), EU doubled the quota for Moldovan wine. In March 2010 Moldova joined European Energy Community, which will contribute to the diversification of the energy sources in Moldova. In just one year, Moldova became a champion in negotiations with EU. Since November 2009 to November 2010 there have been 5 EU Commissioner Visits in Moldova (from 1991 to 2008 just 4 visits). During September Moldova hosted 16 high EU missions. October 2010

Current relations
During the summer of 2010, many Europeans newspapers as Der Spiegel, The Daily Telegraph, Daily Express, Il Giornale, Le Figaro expressed their concerns about Romania giving too many citizenships to Moldova s inhabitants. In 1940, when USSR by force occupied Moldova, they changed the nationality of the Moldova s inhabitants from Romanian to Moldovan and none of them were asked if they wanted to become Soviet Moldovans. The political decision of Moscow to create a new identity - Moldovan , a new language with Cyrillic alphabet - Moldovan was a continuation of the process of Russification that was started in 1812. But what Soviet Union did not take into account is that, they could not erase a memory of a nation. After the 1991 independence, a lot of Moldovans refused the Moldovan identity (written in their ID) as their nationality and sued the Moldovan Government for admitting of the false information in the documents. All in all, the Romanian citizenship offered by Romania comes as a rehabilitation of historical injustice made to Romanians from Moldova. The process is named re-gain of the citizenship, which means that once, because of the historical circumstances the citizenship was lost but without their will. More than 70 % of the Moldova s inhabitants could be eligible for Romanian citizenship. There is no statistical data, but unofficially around 300 000 Moldovans have double citizenship: Romanian and Moldovan and there are around other 1 million applications for Romanian citizenship. The procedure of re-gaining the Romanian citizenship is tough and time consuming (more than 4 years), there is a list of around 20 documents that the applicant has to provide, including certificate of birth of grand-parents, certificate of marriage, criminal records from Moldova and Romania, etc. The applicant has to prove that his grand-parents were born Romanians and he is their descendent. Moreover, Soviet Union Rusificated the Moldovan s name by adding the Russian endings like va and - vici to the Romanian names and in order to be eligible for

Romanian citizenship, the applicant should embrace a bureaucratic and costly process of correcting his name and his parents name.

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A lot of concerns were raised to the number of Romanian citizenships offered to Moldovans, but as we can see in the following table, Romania offers much less citizenships than other EU member states: Another key issue in Moldova EU negotiations is liberalization of visa regime

with EU. I would like to point out that Moldova almost fulfilled the technical requirements for liberalization of visa regime without being asked to (Ukraine did it in 3 years). There were a lot of fears concerning the liberalization of EU Moldova visa regime, most of them related to illegal immigration. But, a logic exercise of the Moldova reality would show that these fears are not realistic. Moldova has around 4 million inhabitants (including Transnistria). According to migration studies, the potential migrants are between 20 to 49 years old. In 2009, in Moldova there were 1,677,616 inhabitants between 20 to 49 years old. Therefore, if there was free visa regime between Moldova and EU 1,677,616 of Moldovans would become potential immigrants. Taking into account that around 30 % of Moldovans (one million) already left the country for EU, US, Russia, etc., the fears of illegal immigration disappear. Moldovans are already in EU, a big majority of them working for 2, 5 and even 8 years without getting a chance to visit their families. An interesting fact is that just 14 % of Moldovan immigrants plan to settle abroad. The free visa regime between Moldova and EU will improve and legalize the situation of Moldovans who work in EU and also would decrease the illegal immigration (some Moldovans pay 4000 Euro to get to EU).

What s next?
An actual question is which way further will Moldova go? Will it st ick to its past or it will try to build a European future? One issue is obvious, the changing of the power in Chisinau brought Moldova back on EU agenda and the international circumstances are very favorable for solving the Transnistria conflict. On 4-5 June 2010, Russia and Germany signed the Meseberg Memorandum. The document proposes creating an EU-Russia Political and Security Policy Committee, to be chaired by the EU s High Representative for Foreign Policy Catherine Ashton and Russia s Foreign Affairs Minister Sergei

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Lavrov, for high-level consultations and decisions. The committee s mandate would include setting ground rules for joint civilian and military crisis management operations by the EU and NATO, as well as working out recommendations on various conflicts and crisis situations, to the resolution of which the European Union and Russia may contribute within appropriate multilateral forums. On these definitions, the EU-Russia Committee would be vested with greater powers than those of the NATO-Russia Council. It would also institute a EU-Russia policy coordination mechanism, such as the EU does not have with the United States or with NATO. The German government has identified the conflict in Moldova s Transnistria region as the issue most likely to demonstrate that the EU can work one-on-one with Russia on European security. In Berlin s view, Russia should ultimately withdraw its troops from Moldova s territory and allow Moldova to reunify with Transnistria. In return for cooperating to settle this conflict, Russia could receive a major role in European security affairs, with access to EU decision-making processes via the proposed committee. The German initiative can generate a positive dynamic in the negotiations on Transnistria. It can also help raise this conflict high on the EU -Russia agenda. After the French-Russian-German summit in Deauville on 18-21 October 2010, the Russian President, Dmitri Medvedev, for the first time in last 20 years, talked about including Romania in Transnistria negotiation process. Some analysts would argue that this propose is related to the invitation of Romania to participate in South Stream project, instead of Nabucco project. On October 21, 2010, the EU Parliament adopted a Resolution concerning EU Moldova relations. The resolution stresses the substantial progress in EUMoldova relations over the last year and calls on the Commission to swiftly adopt a visa liberalization plan for Moldovan citizens. Parliament also approved the recent initiative launched by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President DimitriMedvedev to create a EU-Russia Security Committee to discuss regional issues such as a settlement of the Transnistria conflict.

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In addition to German support, Moldova also received positive signa ls from Central East European countries and Baltic countries, as Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, Estonia, etc. In September 2010, Moldovan Prime -Minister had a bilateral meeting in Budapest with Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orban. The next month, the Hungarian Prime-Minister visited Moldova and reiterated the Hungarian support for Moldova s cause. At the beginning of November, the Polish economist Leszek Balcerowicz, famous for his Shock Therapy (a method for rapidly transitioning from a communist economy, based on state ownership and central planning, to a capitalist market economy), visited Moldova at the invitation of Moldovan Prime-Minister and expressed his will to share with Moldova Poland s experience concerning economic transformations.

Conclusion
In conclusion, one issue is evident; the so-called Moldova twitter revolution had changed the European agenda concerning Moldova. Not so long ago, Moldova was seen as a lost country, black hole of Europe , the poorest European country , a grey zone under Russian influence and no one expected the quick change that would bring Moldova in the headlines. The change came from inside the country, from young Moldovans and students, from the so called twitter generation , who does not accept a totalitarian regime and wish for a better country to live in.

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References:
y Ghinea C., Chirila V., EU -Moldova negotiations. What is to be discussed, what could be achieved, viewed May 22 2011 at: http://www.crpe.ro/eng/library/files/crpeape,eu_%E2%80%93_moldov a_negotiations.pdf y Marandici, I., Remittances and development in Moldova, viewed May 22 2011 at: http://www.viitorul.org/public/1258/en/Marandici_eng_3.pdf y Popescu N., Re-setting the Eastern Partnership in Moldova, November 9, 2009, viewed May 22 2011 at: http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/DigitalLibrary/Publications/Detail/?ots591= 0c54e3b3-1e9c-be1e-2c24-a6a8c7060233&lng=en&id=109583 y Relation of Moldova with EU. Achieved Progress, Encountered Progress and Future Prospects, viewed May26 2011 at: http://web.ceu.hu/cens/assets/files/publications/Exec_EU_Moldova y Deutsche Welle: EU worried about Romanian offer of citizenship to Moldovans, 14.07.2010, viewed May 26 2011at:http://www.dwworld.de/dw/article/0,,4185592,00.html y The telegraph: Romania opens back door for thousands of Moldovans to claim benefits in Britain, 18.07.2010, viewed May 26 2011 at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/moldova/78970 94/Romania-opens-back-door-for-thousands-of-Moldovans-to-claimbenefits-in-Britain.html y Der Spiegel: Entering the EU through the back door, 13.07.2010, viewed June 12 2011, available at: http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,706338,00.html y Georgian daily: Meseberg process: Germany testing EU-Russia Security Cooperation Potential, last accessed on November 7, 2010, viewed June 12 2011 at: http://georgiandaily.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id =20264&Itemid=132 y European Union-External Action, Eastern partnership, viewed June 12 2011at: http://eeas.europa.eu/eastern/index_en.htm

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