No common strategy. Whatever the result turns out to be, the European Council session on 4 February will be historic in the sense that for the first time, heads of state and government will hold a session exclusively on the subject of energy. The EU has never explicitly tackled the subject at such a high level before and we can be sure that some government leaders will not know a great deal about this area. Other leaders have been dealing with this issue at a national level but without holding European level discussions. There have been examples of coordination between two or three countries on one or other dossier but for the mostpart, initiatives are national, with each country following its own strategy. I am referring, above all, to the most politically sensitive aspect involving supply strategies and relations with non-EU supply countries. European action does exist for other important areas and there has been progress towards the single market, energy efficiency, coordinated infrastructure, energy savings and alternative sources of energy. Readers may wish to refer to the comprehensive account provided two days ago in EUROPE 10290. The Hungarian Presidency of the “Energy” Council and the president of the European Commission, however, have not highlighted the most sensitive and crucial dimension involving oil and gas supplies and relations with non-EU supply countries. This subject was mentioned in a cursory manner, with the announcement of the Commission's forthcoming document and Mr Barroso's intention to travel to Azerbaijan next week, to clarify the situation with regard to the Nabucco and South Stream projects. In the meantime, it looks unlikely that there will be any coordination of national positions on the agenda. Until now, EU countries' strategies are not only largely autonomous, with each country acting on its own behalf, they are even contradictory and sometimes rival each other or are incompatible.
A preliminary exchange of views? Is it likely that the European Council will not discuss the matter then? Its president, Herman Van Rompuy, has made it understood that this is not the case. On Wednesday, in his Lectio Inauguralis for the academic year at the European College of Palma, he in fact declared: “We need to make our supplies secure. A country on its own is unable to meet this challenge. This theme will be on the agenda of the European Council on 4 February.” Obviously, he is not expecting any miracles but it does appear likely that he will discuss this issue, which has never been the subject of any genuine European level debates before. It is also understandable that ministers responsible for energy have not discussed this issue either because the subject very often goes above their heads: some heads of state and government have already dealt with this issue for a long time at their respective levels but… not with other parties. On 4 February, they will strive to go beyond the stage of declarations of principle and this in itself will not be a bad start.
Diverging national positions. Divergences or different directions and positions have sometimes, over the years, assumed spectacular dimensions. The initiative taken by Germany and Russia to build the North Stream pipeline under the Baltic Sea had been interpreted by Poland as an unfriendly initiative to bypass its territory. The project also encountered some very real misgivings in the countries bordering the Baltic. The South Stream project was considered (and partly appeared to be) a duplication of the Nabucco project, which France, in practice, ruled out for political reasons. Several observers still consider that Nabucco and South Stream are incompatible or duplicate each other's work. EU relations with Belarus appear in a number of cases to be more determined by energy perspectives than by political choices. The orientations of some European countries seem in a few cases to be determined more by the oil companies than by the political authorities. Certain bilateral agreements on Russian gas imports are so advantageous to the exporting country that certain European participants are attempting to amend them legally. The now famous secret US embassy files which were published indicate US distrust and reservations about the almost total dependency of certain EU countries on Russian gas supplies or supplies controlled by Russia. Washington has a number of concerns and suspicions in this respect.
A beginning? Some of the reports about the meeting between Germany and Italy, which recently took place in Berlin, mention a project involving shared gas purchases by major EU countries, from Russia and elsewhere, in an effort to strengthen their contractual bargaining position. We will have to wait and see whether this is a serious project and whether it is discussed at the summit on 4 February, which would lend it some weight and greater importance.
(F.R./transl.fl)