Agro Perspectiva

European Commissioners visit Moscow: focus on Cyprus

21.03.2013 09:16 "Agro Perspectiva" (Kyiv) — The European Union and Russia will start a two-day meeting in Moscow on Thursday. President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso will be accompanied by 16 out of 27 European commissioners and 100 experts and aides. Such meetings have been held since 1997, but the EU has not sent out such a delegation before. Jose Manuel Barroso will meet Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Voice of Russia correspondent said. This year, a new urgent issue, the financial problem of Cyprus, has been included in the traditional package of topics. The two sides will discuss visa-free travel, energy and trade. Russia is planning to promote work on a new basic agreement on partnership and cooperation with the EU. Unsurprisingly, Brussels and Moscow are close to simplifying the visa regime. However, no one expects that the EU will open its doors wide after the forthcoming consultations in Moscow. A discussion on visa-free regime started in 2003, and it will hardly end in the next 3–5 years. However, according to Russian envoy in Brussels Vladimir Chizhov, an agreement on simplifying the visa-regime is ready, and it will minimize the procedure of issuing short-term and multi-entry visas for Russian citizens. A visa-free regime is essential for the EU as well as Russia. It will simplify the life of businessmen and promote cooperation in trade, science and culture. The western countries of the EU support it but the new members from the East oppose it, says deputy director of the Russian Institute for European Studies Mikhail Nosov. «The Baltic countries are still haunted by the fear of the Soviet Union although Russia has long ceased to be the USSR. They will oppose the agreement. But I do not think that their point of view will prevail. The main contradiction between the EU and Russia is that unfortunately, we do not trust each other. Until we learn to trust each other, the distrust will affect all other problems,» Mikhail Nosov said. Russian experts insist that it is almost impossible to imagine when the EU and Russia will agree on the abolition of visas. Russian analysts believe that no one should expect a breakthrough in the forthcoming meeting. This is not the fault of Russia but the inertness of the current EU administration, says deputy head of the foreign affairs committee of the Upper House of Russian parliament Andrei Klimov. «On the one hand, we have partnership relations but on the other, we are competitors. Russia has a lot of questions to many competitors. It is a different story how to solve them: fast or slowly, effectively or not. It seems that the current team that heads the EU Jose Manuel Barroso and President of the European Council Herman van Rompuy are used to working within a certain framework. As long as they head the EU no one should expect breakthroughs,» Andrei Klimov said. In fact, Herman van Rompuy has already announced that he will step down by the end of 2014 when his term ends. At present, Russia comfortably cooperates with all members of the EU separately.