EU SEEKS TO BUILD ENERGY TIES WITH NEIGHBOURS
By Tony Barber in Brussels
FT
September 4 2007 03:00
The European Union yesterday identified closer energy co-operation as
a central -element of its efforts to strengthen ties with more than
a dozen neighbouring states in eastern Europe, north Africa and the
Middle East.
Benita Ferrero-Waldner, EU commissioner for external relations,
said the European Commission would launch a study into how to make
energy markets in the region work better for consumers, producers
and transit countries.
The EU has become increasingly concerned in the past two years about
Russia’s rising influence over European energy -markets. It hopes to
rebalance Moscow’s role by expanding energy ties with neighbours such
as Algeria and Azerbaijan.
The framework for these initiatives is the EU’s European Neighbourhood
Policy (ENP), which embraces 15 countries, from Georgia and Ukraine
to Lebanon and Tunisia, as well as the Palestinian Authority.
None of the 15 countries is an official candidate for EU membership
but it believes warm relations with them will help reduce instability
on its far-flung borders. It has allocated â~B¬12bn ($16bn, £8.1bn)
for the ENP from 2007 to 2013.
Mrs Ferrero-Waldner suggested the ENP fitted in well with the EU’s
goal of promoting less wasteful energy use because some neighbouring
countries had huge potential in solar and wind power and in biofuels.
"We know our partners are interested in exporting renewable energy to
the EU. And that matches our own interest in finding ways of meeting
our targets on renewable energies," she said.
The commissioner said that the EU had already reached energy agreements
with Azerbaijan, Morocco and Ukraine and was hoping to sign memoranda
of understanding with Algeria and Egypt.
She was speaking in Brussels at the first conference of foreign
ministers and senior officials from the EU’s 27 member states and the
16 neighbours to be held since the EU began its neighbourhood policy
in 2004.
Her emphasis on energy ties reflected the Commission’s desire to
give a sharper focus to the ENP after three years in which it has
come under fire for lacking a clear sense of purpose.
One failing, acknowledged by the Commission in a report last December,
is that the ENP has done little to solve territorial "frozen conflicts"
pitting Russia against Georgia and Moldova.
Another criticism is that the EU, by including countries such as
Armenia, Georgia and Ukraine in the ENP, is not doing justice to the
aspirations of these states to become full EU members in the longer
term. A third criticism is that the ENP is inherently unwieldy.
José Manuel Barroso, the Commission president, told the conference
that the ENP worked because EU member states gave neighbours more
support than when they looked at them in isolation.
"No longer is the level of attention paid to one country or region
dependent on the special interest of whatever EU member state happens
to be holding the [EU] presidency at the time," he said.
–Boundary_(ID_z5n0Wr1ateGk/h17pxF1fA)–