Policy brief: Challenges for deeper EU integration with Eastern Europe

The EU will have to tackle three challenges to keep the EaP on track; and cooperation with Belarus with an allowance for the specific situation in the country, is one of the three challenges.

“The 2009 Eastern Partnership (EaP) represented a turning point in the European Union's (EU) engagement with post- Soviet states. The EaP extended the integration path initially only to Ukraine – the regional 'frontrunner' to other eastern EU neighbours. This path includes 'political cooperation and economic integration' through Association Agreements (AA) with Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas (DCFTA), progressive visa liberalization and sectoral cooperation.

The AAs with DCFTAs, in particular, signal a major change in the EU's approach to its neighborhood. In the East, previous EU instruments only helped to familiarize partner countries with EU regulations. In contrast, the DCFTAs entail more wide-ranging and far-reaching approximation. The AAs, the longest and most detailed agreements of their kind, contain detailed and binding provisions on partner countries to align their laws and policies with the acquis, signaling a shift from soft- to hard-law commitments. Compared to previous EU policies, the EaP toolbox has greater potential to induce and stimulate domestic reforms in the region.

However, Armenia's decision to join the Russia-led Eurasian Customs Union (ECU) and the uncertainties around Ukraine's signing of the AA at the EaP Summit in Vilnius on 28-29 November place a question mark over Eastern neighbors' actual willingness, capacities and prospects of integrating with the EU. These examples are not isolated and reflect the EU's difficulties in diffusing its rules and policies to the Eastern neighborhood”, - the background of EU-Eastern Europe cooperation is described.

The full text of the document can be found here.

This paper is written as part of a collaborative research project 'Exploring the Role of the EU in Domestic Change in the Post-Soviet States' jointly funded by the ESRC and ANR as part of the scheme called 'Open Research Area in Europe'.