“We recognize that giving people hope without a clear membership perspective is difficult” stated Mr. Graham Watson, Rapporteur of the EU – Moldova Association Agreement during the today’s conference on key priorities of the EU – Moldova agenda.

The conference organized today in Brussels by the Romanian Center for European Policies (CRPE), the Foreign Policy Association (APE) of Moldova and Moldovan Mission to the EU enjoyed the participation of Mr. Watson, members of the negotiation team of the Republic of Moldova, other members of the European Parliament, Commission officials and expert from Brussels based EU think-tanks. Mr. Watson encouraged the Moldovan officials and considered that `the membership perspective for Republic of Moldova is not a taboo subject in Brussels`. On the contrary, Mr. Watson continued, we `will discuss the subject if Moldova would be prepared. There is no example of a European country willing to join the EU and prepared to do so that was refused`.

The Chief negotiator from the Moldovan Government, Mrs. Natalia Gherman, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration main an introduction on the current state of play of the negotiations on the EU-Moldova Association Agreement. Additionally, Mrs. Gherman announced the recent decision made in Chisinau for Moldova to issue only biometric passports from January 1, 2011, as part of the attempts to obtain a road-map for visas regime liberalization. The Moldovan Government already started implementing the measures the EU asked from the Western Balkans countries within their road-maps.

Cristian Ghinea, director of the Romanian Center for European Policies and Victor Chirila, executive director of the Foreign Policy Association presented the recommendations of the report released during the conference “EU – Moldova negotiations – What is to be discussed, what could be achieved?”.

The report (the summary is below) recommends the EU to make Moldova the success story that the Eastern Partnership needs to obtain viability and credibility.

Recommendations for the Moldovan government:

While not abandoning its attempt to obtain a membership perspective, Moldova should not make an obsession out of it, but rather fully use the wide range of incentives EU is ready to offer in terms of development aid and financial support.

Maintain the reformist momentum, empower ministries to continue reforms even in the electoral period and Moldova will be in a stronger positions to ask for membership perspective in 2 – 3 years.

For the EU Council and Commission:

– Replace the simplistic line “no political decision on membership perspective” with a sympathetic recognition of Moldova`s ambitions

– Compensate the lack of political decision on enlargement with real, immediate and measurable incentives. The first step should be to offer a road map for free-visas regime

– Create Ms / Mr Europe in Chisinau – Stop the double EU representation (Special Representative and Head of EU Delegation). Use the symbolic capital EU has to support reformist policies

– Draw the correct lessons from the previous Action Plan with Moldova. Insist on implementation side and create clear performance indicator.

The report also recommends the European Parliament to adopt for Moldova a similar resolution with the one mentioning perspective membership for Ukraine (March 2010).

Victor Chirila described the reforms that Moldova undertook even without having a road map towards visa liberalization, concluding that Chisinau is on a similar path with Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia, which had at that moment a road map. Granting a Visa Road Map to Moldova will be an enormous incentive for democratic reforms and the EU has to articulate a clear message that visa liberalization dialogue would open the way to the Visa Road Map if Moldova implements the necessary preconditions, concluded Chirila.

The second panel of the conference invited Michael Emerson from the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), Octavian Calmic, Deputy Minister of Economy of the Republic of Moldova and Phillippe Cuisson, Deputy Head of Unit, DG Trade, European Commission to discuss the perspectives for the negotiations on a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area. Mr. Emerson brought the example of Georgia, which unilaterally opened its markets and attracted investors. But the Commission official mentioned the Georgian example is not suitable for Moldova, which should concentrate on improving its governance. A debate started between the two participants whether more and fast openness would benefit or harm the Moldovan economy. Mr. Calmic described the challenges faced by the Moldovan government in reforming the economy and draw a set of priorities in this regard.

The conference was part of the project `Romania – Moldova partnership for European integration. The Contribution of the Civil Society` jointly sponsored by the Romanian and Moldovan Soros foundations.

The full report “EU – Moldova negotiations – What is to be discussed, what could be achieved?” will be available at www.crpe.ro/eng

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EU – Moldova negotiations
What is to be discussed, what could be achieved?

– Summary –

Authors: Cristian Ghinea and Victor Chirilă

Recommendations:

Moldova could be the success story of the Eastern Partnership
While the EU is reluctant to offer a membership perspective to Moldova, it should make it clear the country will be judged exclusively on its own merits. Moldova should be assured it will not be treated as a part of a bloc, neither a bloc with Ukraine, nor one with the Eastern Partnership. This would represent a morale boost for the Moldovan public, which is haunted by geo-political fatalism.
Our report presents several arguments supporting the exceptionality case of Moldova within the Eastern Partnership. If it is to prove itself serious about its Eastern dimension and its willingness to make the Eastern Partnership (EaP) a substantial policy, EU could hardly find a better opportunity than to encourage the current direction adopted by Moldova. There is consensus among experts that the EaP suffers from lack of clear perspectives and success stories. Moldova should be the success story to give viability and credibility to the EaP.
 

For the Moldovan government

The Moldovan government’s decision to put temporarily aside the issue of a membership perspective and to focus on technical aspects of negotiations was a good one. The EU is not ready to offer a membership perspective to Moldova but the country is entering the EU agenda and a decision would become unavoidable if Moldova maintains the current path of reforms. The Moldovan government should concentrate on the reforms it already promised (e.g. concrete implementation of the Rethink Moldova strategy). If the negotiations on Association Agreement (AA) maintain the current fast pace, Moldova will subsequently face a difficult dilemma: should it accept an agreement without political promises or delay / block the talks until the EU will be ready to offer something more promising? We recommend the first option. Finishing the agreement will provide a new and advanced cooperation framework with the EU compared with the status-quo, even without a clear membership perspective.

Nevertheless, the new framework and the content of the agreement will be in fact a way to prepare the country for a future accession. This was implied in our interviews with EU officials and this is the signal Moldova is receiving at unofficial level. While not abandoning its attempt to obtain a membership perspective, Moldova should not make an obsession out of it, but rather fully use the wide range of incentives EU is ready to offer in terms of development aid and financial support.

The real stake now is in Chisinau, not in Brussels. The EU got the message and now the Moldovan authorities should avoid widening the gap between political will and the lack of administrative capacity. If Moldova will pass the future election test, maintain the reformist pace and complete AA negotiations with the EU, it will be in a stronger position to demand political promises in a two – three year period.

EU integration is a consensual issue among the Moldovan governing-coalition members and it could provide a minimal consensus base even with the opposition Party of Communists. Maybe a political pact should be proposed in the following period to protect EU-Moldova relations from internal political infighting.
For the EU Council and Commission
The reluctance to make membership promises to Moldova should leave space for a flexible approach in which the EU would be ready to encourage and support Moldova`s political aspirations if the internal reforms will be carried out. Although this may seem ambitious in the enlargement fatigue context, in fact it would not constitute a major departure from what the EU already officially promised to Moldova in 2005 (see details in report). Meanwhile, a sympathetic recognition of Moldova`s ambitions is necessary to support the reformist tendencies on Chisinau.
The EU should compensate the lack of political decision on enlargement with real, immediate and measurable incentives. The first step should be to offer a road map for free-visas regime. Liberalization of visas could be a first and significant change felt by the common Moldovans from the much talked about new relation with the EU.
We also strongly recommend stopping the double EU representation in Chisinau (Special Representative and Head of EU Delegation). Following the recent development in implementing the Lisbon treaty and creating the EU External Service, the two positions in Chisinau should be unified. The new official should carefully manage the symbolic capital of EU image in Moldova and consistently encourage the reformist and democratic policies there.
 

For the European Parliament

The EP should continue the line of the February 2010 Recommendations of the EU-Moldova Parliamentary Cooperation Committee that supported the goal `of the Republic of Moldova… to become a member of the EU in the future`. In March 2010 the EP adopted a resolution on Ukraine saying the country "may apply for membership of the EU like any European state that adheres to the principles of liberty, democracy, respect for human rights…`. On short term the priority is for the EP to adopt a similar resolution on Moldova.
From a general perspective, the EP should involve itself more in the content of the AA negotiations, using the post-Lisbon momentum.

Lessons learned from the previous Moldova – EU Action Plan
Recommendations for the future Association Agreement
In drafting the AA and the future Action Plan, the European Commission should pay much more attention to the implementation side. A real implementation gap developed in Moldova in 2005 – 2009 (fully visible in measurements such as Global Integrity Report). The Commission should change its legalistic approach that dominated the former Action Plan and to focus on concrete transformations. Performance indicators should be developed for each area (or transfer the indicators used for the 2004 / 2007 enlargement waves) and they should be strictly followed in the regular reports. The performances should be directly linked with the financial support, with clear benchmarks: `money for implementing reforms`.
Particularly in the justice area, the Commission should carefully evaluate the situation and identify the real reformist actors in the system before pushing for complex institutional designs imported from outside. The artificiall creation of new veto players to defend the status quo should be avoided
The role of the Parliament and civil society in monitoring the implementation of Action Plan should be increased and mentioned in the document from the very beginning.
Urgency: Administrative Capacity

Besides the political costs and the lack of willingness of the former governments, the former EU – Moldova action plan was undermined by the structural problems within the central administration. Its capacity is widely recognized as being weak and insufficient for a coherent coordination of the European Integration process. Improvements are needed both in terms of staff, as well as systems and coordination mechanisms.

The EU integration agenda does not differ too much from Moldovan internal one, oriented towards development (with donors` support). But EU integration is managed by separate bodies within the ministries, isolated from the ones managing the domestic agenda. This is a way to waste resources already limited. The EU integration and general policy coordination should be treated as an integrated process. A clear system with fewer documents, concrete roles for coordinating institutions and coherent procedures would benefit Moldova and also its EU path.

Visa Dialogue: achievements, current realities and prospects

In order to understand better the level of Moldova’s readiness to start visa liberalization dialogue with the EU, we drafted a comparative presentation between Moldova’s achievements and the progresses made by Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia in the process of implementing the Road Maps, as they were evaluated by the European Commission in its Assessments reports from May 18, 2009.

According with this comparative presentation (See the Annex of the report), Moldova has managed to undertake many similar or comparable legal and institutional reforms with those accomplished by Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia in the process of implementing the Road Maps for visa liberalization granted to them by the EU in 2008.

We make 18 technical recommendations for the Moldovan government, following the road maps of the above mentioned countries. These recommendations should be integrated in a short and medium term Action Plan that would give a clear guidance to the relevant Moldovan institutions.

After making this comparative analysis we conclude that Moldova is already consistently following the same path of transformations as Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia without having the road maps these countries had at the moment. This is what an expert called `preemptive implementation` and is illustrative for the new approach Chisinau has in its relation with EU.

Nevertheless granting a real and formal Road Map to Moldova on visas would be a powerful message of support to the current pro-European and pro-reform Moldovan Government. On the one hand, it would motivate Moldovan authorities to increase the rhythm and quality of required reforms and, on the other hand, would give the EU an important leverage to channel in the right direction the reform course of the country.

Giving Moldova a Visa Road Map would not be a gift, on the contrary, the EU will condition its deliverance upon fulfilling concrete pre-conditions. We know that recently the European Commission has proposed to the EU member states to offer Ukraine a set of pre-conditions for granting a Visa Liberalization Road Map, such as:

1) issuing biometric passports;

2) creating a national authority in the field of migration;

3) adoption of legislation in the area of protection of personal data; and

4) presenting the questionnaire on the identity and travel documents personalization system.

Paradoxically or not, Moldova has already fulfilled the above conditions without being asked to. This speaks volumes about the will of the Moldovan government to advance in EU talks.