The 48th Munich Conference for Security held the other day in the Bavarian capital demonstrated that some countries understood the importance of the issues discussed and the way the new challenges should be accepted. Other countries did not understand it.
Unfortunately, Ukraine is among the latter ones, though it was represented by the president and the foreign minister. However, just like last year Ukraine demonstrated passiveness and lack of initiative and did not even try to persuade Europe that our membership in the EU will be an added value and not a burden as most of the EU members think. The President Viktor Yanukovych confined himself to participating only in the panel “Energy, Resources and the Environment: New Security Parameters?” and said nothing new. He mentioned Ukraine’s role as the important transit country, complained about the disadvantageous gas contract signed in 2009 with Russia, urged to create a trilateral gas consortium and emphasized the importance of having transparent and fair international rules for energy cooperation. However, these rules exist but some of the EU partners do not want to fulfill them.
It seems that other topics such as “Building the Euro-Atlantic Security Community” did not interest our Ukrainian high-ranking officials who had often spoken about the necessity to create the Euro-Atlantic collective security system regardless of the existing and efficient North Atlantic Alliance. They were just absent when this issue was discussed though they knew that the US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen were going to speak. Only one of the Ukrainian politicians, leader of the party Front of Change Arsenii Yatseniuk was present there, by the way, he asked Yanukovych about Tymoshenko at the panel the president participated in but did not hear any reply from him.
The fact that the president was absent when such an important issue was discussed can be hardly explained by the necessity to meet the former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger to tell him about the difficult economic situation in our country and hear his words: “I see Ukraine only as strong and independent, for peace in Europe depends on it.”
Obviously, the Ukrainian president would have demonstrated good manners if he had come to hear Hillary Clinton’s speech since he met her later. Their conversation would have been more substantial taking into consideration that in her speech the secretary of state defined the further directions of cooperation between the US and Europe. Probably, the result of their conversation would have been more significant for the development of bilateral relations. However, in all probability, the main issue of this meeting in Munich was Tymoshenko case and what the president can do to allow the foreign doctors help treating the former prime minister and finally release her so that she could participate in the parliamentary election. The commentary the Ukrainian president gave to the media after meeting Clinton proved it.
All the Western media noticed that it was the first time that the US secretary of state and head of the Pentagon both took part in the Munich conference. The Europe took it as a signal that Washington is not going to leave its European allies despite shrinking the military expenses and focusing its attention on the Asia-Pacific region. At the same time the US urge Europe to stop cutting down the military budgets and to put its economy in order so that the Alliance was strong.
In her speech Clinton clearly emphasized: Europe will remain the main America’s partner. By the way, except for the secretary of state and the secretary of defense the whole team participated in the conference: Henry Kissinger who moderated one of the panels, head of the World Bank Robert Zoellick, senators John Kerry, John McCain, and Joseph Lieberman. The three latter sat together in the front row.
“Here in Munich, it is not enough to reaffirm old commitments. The world around us is fast transforming, and America and Europe need a forward-leaning agenda to deal with the challenges we face,” emphasized the secretary of state.
Clinton discussed five areas requiring greater collective efforts:
“First, we have to finish the business our predecessors started, and build a Europe that is secure, united, and democratic.
“Second, because the strength of our alliance depends on the health of our economies, security and prosperity are ultimately inseparable. That means we need a common agenda for economic recovery and growth that is every bit as compelling as our global security cooperation.
“Third, in a time of tight budgets we need to ensure that our security alliance is agile and efficient, as well as strong. That is what Secretary General Rasmussen calls “smart defense”: joint deployment of missile defenses, the commonly-funded Alliance Ground Surveillance program, Baltic air policing, and a reinvigorated NATO response force. These are practical ways to provide security while minimizing cost to any one nation.
“Fourth, our shared values are the bedrock of our community. We need to vigorously promote these together around the world, especially in this time of transformational political change.
“Fifth and finally, we have to reach out to emerging powers and regions. The world we have worked together to build is changing. There are new centers of wealth and power, and fewer problems can be addressed decisively by America and Europe alone. So we have a challenge to make the most of this critical window of opportunity, to enlist emerging powers as partners, and strengthening a global architecture of cooperation that benefits us all.”
All those speeches and Clinton, Panetta, McCain, Zoellick, and Kissinger’s participation in the Munich conference prove that the US understand Europe’s importance as their indispensable partner. We cannot say the same about the Ukrainian authorities who, in all probability, participated in this conference because of their narrow interests. They could not hide their desire to resolve the tactical questions of energy and image instead of the strategic ones. It sounds trivial but we should repeat once again: Kyiv is expected to first of all meet the democratic standards that make the basis of the community we want to join.
