Not many champagne bottles are being opened in Ukraine, Moldova or Georgia to celebrate progress of the EU in launching the Eastern Partnership, its new flagship project meant to improve ties with the six neighbouring countries of Eastern Europe. Premature toasts would be ill-advised but there is reason for cautious optimism that the EU will now devote at least marginally more attention to its troubled vicinity. The Eastern neighbours should welcome the initiative, do their homework and ask for more. They should expect the EU to put its money and effort where its mouth is and continue on the path that, if successful, will bring them closer to the eventual membership in the European Union.

The Eastern Partnership is a mirror image of the French-inspired Union for the Mediterranean. If it was not for the Georgian war, it would have slowly matured in Polish, Swedish and Czech (next year’s EU presidency) oak bottles. Turmoil in the Caucasus heightened the pressure to make the offer for the Eastern neighbours both quicker and more tangible. It also coincided with the growing frustration with the European Neighbourhood Policy which was designed at a different historical moment. Carrying the traces of the big bang enlargement of 2004 - 2007 without the offer of membership, it was regarded with a high degree of suspicion by the neighbours themselves. Following the Polish-Swedish initiative in the early summer, the Commission’s communication of 4 December spells out in detail what can be expected when it comes to the content of the Eastern Partnership. For some, it will be ENP dressed in new clothes, for others - a new strategic programme of greater EU engagement in its immediate vicinity.

The new offer naturally shifts the debate to the wider international context of the policy towards the neighbourhood as well as to its potential implications for EU - Russia relations. The European concept of closer economic ties and enhanced political and social dialogue as a means of building an effective influence in its proximity meets with relative indifference in Moscow. Both the EU and Russia feel intuitively that their say over the disputed neighbourhood is growing but neither side is concerned over what the other one is up to. The EU is additionally constrained by its lack of tradition to act strategically in foreign policy.

What is more, the EU must not take for granted that its new offer will spark enthusiasm of the six partner countries and inspire enormous efforts to arduously implement an ever greater number of EU laws and regulations. The success of the new proposal will be a function of the responsiveness of the countries concerned with respect to the fresh set of sticks and carrots on offer. It will be difficult to achieve it without a clear and attractive end-point result in sight.

Having said that, the Eastern Partnership is certainly not a dishonest attempt to brush up the EU’s unconvincing stance towards the neighbourhood. Politically, it is a symmetrical reflection of the latest steps taken by NATO towards Ukraine and Georgia. The decision not to grant these countries Membership Action Plan (MAP) does not exclude their eventual membership in the Alliance. On the contrary, strengthening their institutions and building their capacities through NATO Commissions could eventually prove to be as effective and in the end lead to an admission to the Alliance when the time is ripe. The same logic applies to the Eastern Partnership, regardless of all the differences between the EU and NATO processes. It is tangible and flexible enough to be properly responsive to the neighbouring countries’ deficiencies and needs. The more strings attached, the stronger the leverage for further EU efforts in the area. As Radosław Sikorski, Polish Foreign Minister stressed, the Eastern Partnership does not prejudge any shape of future relations between the EU and its partners. It does not provide them with a promise of EU membership but it puts them on track towards that goal.

Furthermore, looking at the EU internal dimension, the Eastern Partnership proposal could not have been more timely. The upcoming EU Presidencies of the Czech Republic and Sweden will demonstrate much determination to continue the project and implement its objectives. The new proposal ranks among top priorities of both Stockholm and Prague which is not negligible. This commitment is further reinforced by the unique context of the upcoming 20th anniversary of the fall of Iron Curtain and the 5th anniversary of the historical enlargement of the European Union.

One needs to be clear about what the Eastern Partnership is and what it is not. It is an end of the European Neighbourhood Policy as we know it and especially of the idea of putting the Eastern and Southern neighbours into the same basket. However, it is not an entirely new idea since most of the instruments which are suggested under the umbrella of the Eastern Partnership have been used in the past or are being tested in reality anyway, including negotiations on the deep free trade agreement with Ukraine.

What could be worrying in the broader context is that the Eastern Partnership does not solve the key strategic question as to the future orientation of the region and the EU’s policy towards it. It is a triumph of “constructive ambiguity”, the principle that the EU has applied to those of its neighbours who can in theory file for membership on the basis of article 49 of the Treaty. But there is no dot over the “i” as to whether the EU now feels responsible for countries in the area or whether in fact it is politely saying to them that they cannot count on membership in the future and should focus their minds on something else instead.

The Commission’s proposal on the Eastern Partnership contains, however a number of important elements. It puts emphasis on the Association Agreements and economic integration based on deep free trade which is crucial to a more organic relationship although it does not stress strongly enough that the deep free trade needs to have a high level of ambition, envisaging adoption of the EU regulatory framework in most areas of community legislation and providing the Eastern partners with sufficient incentives, including financial ones, for the purpose. The proposal does not call – as it should -for strong institutions of the Association which are indispensable to govern the relationship. It rightly makes issues of mobility and security on the one hand and energy on the other central elements of the package. It says everything it needs to say on the perspective of visa-free travel which is a number one priority for the Eastern partners. However, it does not spell out what the partners’ involvement in the EU’s actions as part of the Common Foreign and Security Policy could be, especially when it comes to EU crisis management missions where potential for cooperation is sizeable.

The Commission rightly proposes a beefed up structure for the Eastern Partnership including summits, ministerial meetings (on the margins of GAERC session which will make EU foreign ministers sneak out of the room in beforehand) and four policy platforms. This new framework is necessary in order to reflect the political nature of the relationship as well as to generate ground for much-needed reforms. The Commission’s communication contains a promise of a little more money for the eastern neighbours, 600 million fresh and reprogrammed funds for the period of 2007-2013 which is a welcome but dismally small amount compared to the needs. It is also much less than the donors’ conference for Georgia generated a few weeks ago. Caution should be expressed when it comes to specific projects which are rightly aimed to improve visibility of the Eastern Partnership and help in respective areas but they will by themselves not be able to turn things around.

There is too little in the proposal on how the Eastern Partnership is meant to mature to an ever closer relationship with the possible perspective of accession at the end of the road. The neighbours should know better what they can expect out of the relationship. The idea of a Neighbourhood Economic Community, creating a broader regional trading platform is of limited value, as evidenced by the disappointing record of the Central European Free Trade Area (CEFTA) in the past. The six countries of the Eastern Partnership have different economic profiles and trade relatively little with each other. What is more they are either negotiating already or will negotiate the deep free trade agreements with the EU on a bilateral basis. A regional trading platform would therefore carry the risk of adopting the lowest common denominator and foregoing the real gains which are to be made in relations between Eastern neighbours and the European Union. The Eastern Partnership proposal is also very timid when it comes to building a sense of inclusion for the Eastern partners by means of inviting them to observe the decision-making process in selected areas. This concept should be taken up when the Eastern Partnership is launched in the spring.

All in all, the success of the Eastern Partnership will be a function of the determination with which it is implemented. There have been many ideas in the recent years on how to improve ties with the Eastern neighbours, including by means of an Enhanced ENP or ENP plus. The added value of the new proposal is a function of the unprecedented international context as well as the favorable internal environment, helped by the Polish, Swedish and Czech leadership. Hence, whatever one thinks about the content and prospects of the Eastern Partnership, it has been put on the table at the right point in time. Nevertheless, the EU still needs to be far more convincing about the larger vision for its neighbourhood policy, if the Eastern Partnership is to live up to its expectations.

* Paweł Świeboda is president and Maria Sadowska is head of „Europe in the world” programme in demosEUROPA – Centre for European Strategy.

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