By Vestnik Kavkaza
The 50th Munich Security Conference will begin in Germany on January 31st, 2014. Seven years ago, Vladimir Putin made his famous Munich speech which was considered by some Western political scientists as the beginning of a new Cold War.
This time, 20 heads of states and governments and more than 50 foreign ministers and defense ministers will discuss the situation in Syria, relations with Iran, the crisis in Ukraine, the future of the Trans-Atlantic Union and roles of Russian, the EU, and the USA in settlement of important problems of the international security.
Dmitry Danilov, Head of the Department of European Security of the RAS Institute of Europe, sees several important topics for discussion: “The first one is relate to the possible reconfiguration of Transatlantic relations within the Alliance, or in a wider transatlantic context, for it is crucial for Russia, defining its major destinations of foreign policy for the future. Is it NATO? Or its separate members? How will German-American, or European-American relations change? Where can Russia search for partners without provoking any breakup lines within the Atlantic Alliance? As a matter of fact, Russia is interested in relatively strong transatlantic relations, as well as in those relations providing another very serious connection – that of Russia with our Western partners, including though NATO. And here Afghanistan is not the only topic, though it is very important and can be considered the key issue. In reality, in this case it is about the possibility to discuss a common strategy in Afghanistan after the withdrawal of NATO troops.”
According to Danilov, “for Russia, the reforming of NATO’s functional activity, how the military activity related to military training within NATO will be reformatted, how training will be carried out, for they will certainly be intensified, are important issues. It is no secret that both Russia and our Western partners every now and then blame each other of, if not provoking military activity, at least of an unfriendly attitude, even when talking about military training.”
Danilov thinks that another essential topic is the struggle against international terrorism: “Despite all the declarations about having to unite our efforts to struggle against non-traditional challenges, for a real struggle against international terrorism we don’t have enough mutual understanding, and, most importantly, practical cooperation. And this topic is comprehensive, it concerns all the aspects of our life. It shall be discussed very widely and seriously, including in the context of Afghanistan and today’s conflicts in the Middle East, in Africa etc.”
Sergei Oznobischev, head of the Institute of World Economy and International Relations at the Academy of Sciences of Russia, Professor at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations at the Foreign Ministry of Russia, is sure that today we have very cold relations between NATO and Russia: “We try to find spheres for cooperation and partnership around these cold relations, which are often have nothing in common with NATO agenda. In fact our partnership should be real and bring real results. The results should be well-known for key political figures in Moscow. Even if there are some results today, unfortunately, they are unknown.”
Speaking about Afghanistan, Oznobishchev stated that “this is a sphere where we should continue our cooperation. In fact relations between NATO and the CSTO should be built. Today the CSTO is doing a lot to predict and prevent future sharp situations which could appear after the NATO and the USA’s withdrawal from Afghanistan. However, all requests to NATO are left unanswered. The CSTO is tired of sending requests, even though we should cooperate, should work, as unstable Afghanistan and Taliban are our common threats. I mean not only terrorism against which the USA fought and then stopped fighting.”
