"Some skepticism" by Angela Merkel

Germany is waiting for Vladimir Putin

German Chancellor Angela Merkel with one single remark gave a special character to today's visit of Vladimir Putin to Berlin. The Russian Prime Minister comes to the German capital to take part in the annual business forum organized by the Sueddeutsche Zeitung. Yesterday, Mr. Putin delivered a policy article in this newspaper entitled “Russia and Europe: from understanding the lessons of the crisis to a new partnership agenda.”

Vladimir Putin writes that in the face of the crisis, both Russia and the EU “were quite vulnerable economically”: “Russia remains highly dependent on the raw material situation. The European Union, reaping the benefits of many years of deindustrialization, is faced with a real threat of weakening its position in the markets of industrial and high-tech products.” The Prime Minister proposes to take advantage of the “real advantages and opportunities” that Russia and the EU have to make a breakthrough.

The ambitious program, as Mr. Putin himself calls it, consists of five points. Firstly, “the creation of a harmonious community of economies from Lisbon to Vladivostok” with the prospect of a common free trade zone. Secondly, “a common industrial policy based on the combination of the technological and resource potentials of Russia and the EU” - modernization of the Russian economy and “encouraging a new wave of industrialization” in Europe. Thirdly, the creation of a “single European energy complex” with the abandonment of the practice of “ill-considered” energy market reforms in the EU. Fourth - cooperation in the field of science and education. Finally, fifthly, the abolition of visas between Russia and the EU, which should become “not the end, but the beginning of the process of real integration.”

“This would be a truly organic synthesis of two economies - the classical, established one in the EU and the new developing one in Russia,” Putin sums up his initiatives.

The Sueddeutsche Zeitung conference started yesterday and Angela Merkel has already spoken at it. She commented on the ideas of the Russian prime minister, showing not an “ambitious”, but a completely pragmatic approach. She noted that the policy pursued by Russia does not correspond to the goals set by Vladimir Putin.

“I would take this with some skepticism. Russia’s recent steps are directed in the other direction,” RIA Novosti quotes Angela Merkel as saying about the creation of a single trade space “from Lisbon to Vladivostok.” She considers the creation of the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, which was activated last year and has baffled all of Moscow’s partners in negotiations on accession to the WTO, to be a step “in the other direction.” “This does not make it easier for us to resolve the issue of creating a free trade area between Russia and the EU, since the issue of membership in the WTO for Belarus or Kazakhstan has been resolved even less than with Russia,” said the German Chancellor.

It is impossible not to pay attention to the fact that the new “Putin plan” appeared two weeks before the Russia-EU summit in Brussels, in which President Dmitry Medvedev will participate. And although the abolition of visas and a new energy agreement are points of policy pursued by the head of state, it is not entirely clear whether the prime minister’s initiatives are Moscow’s official negotiating position, which the president must now defend.

Andrey DENISOV