NATO-RUSSIA: Ministers Convene First Permanent Joint Council

By Farhan Haq Reprint | | Print |

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 26 1997 (IPS) - Analysts are cautiously optimistic after Friday’s first meeting of the Permanent Joint Council of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and Russia – although little appears to have been accomplished in resolving security disputes between the two sides.

The meeting between the foreign ministers of the 16 NATO member states and Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeni Primakov did not clear up outstanding disputes over the scope of NATO’s enlargement, or policy on Albania or the former Yugoslavia. But the Joint Council’s inaugural meeting also avoided any rifts between Russia and NATO, allowing both sides to see promise in the fledgling cooperation.

“They didn’t fall in love, but they didn’t attack each other either,” says Ottfried Nassauer, director of the Berlin Information-centre for Transatlantic Security (BITS). For Nassauer, the meeting’s main victory was its avoidance of any of the numerous controversies — from nuclear weapons deployment to Bosnia policy — that could derail further cooperation.

“The meeting has been a great success,” NATO Secretary- General Javier Solana said, stressing the “spirit of friendship and cooperation” between the parties. The meeting’s initial discussions of political and structural issues involved in the NATO-Russia relationship would be developed further in another round of discussions by the foreign ministers scheduled for Dec. 16-17, he added.

“We had a rather practical exchange of views,” Primakov said after the meeting. Future success of the Joint Council, he added, will depend on whether the two sides abide by the Founding Act signed by the 17 heads of government last May 27 to govern Russia- NATO relations. In particular, Primakov stressed, future joint work should be based on “increased trust between all sides, equality between all parties… (and) respect for mutual interests and understanding.”

Whether the Permanent Joint Council will be used for such tasks, or will even have the resources to function effectively, is to be addressed at a later day. Although, as Belgian Foreign Minister Erik Deroke pointed out, the meeting discussed future working structures for the NATO-Russia relationship, the two-hour exchange among the foreign ministers was too brief to allow much substantive work.

To that extent, argued Dan Plesch, director of the British- American Security Information Council (BASIC), the meeting was a missed opportunity. “The main thing they have agreed to here is (to cooperate on) peacekeeping,” he said. “When that is the main agreement, it shows that they have agreed to keep the peace among themselves, and nothing else.”

Several major disputes await the 17 governments, BITS argues in a recent report, and these will require more compromise and discussion among the countries than they have so far seen.

“Muddling through is almost certainly going to result in a failure of the Permanent Joint Council,” the report argues. In particular, the German security group contends, nuclear and other arms concerns and the role of the Organisation on Security and Cooperation in Europe in coordinating Russia-NATO relations should be hammered out in detail.

“Everybody recognised that it was opportune to set up adequate consultation mechanisms,” Deryoke said. But the Belgian diplomat was unable to provide much detail on any concrete steps taken to develop such bodies or to discuss nuclear issues more widely, arguing that there was too little Friday.

Other challenges stand in the way of the fledgling Russia-NATO relationship. First, the Founding Act, despite Russia’s hopes that it recognises Moscow’s equality with NATO on many European security issues, “isn’t a treaty with Russia — it’s simply a political agreement,” said Plesch.

There are no legal obstacles to withdrawing from the process of cooperation entailed in the Founding Act, the BITS report adds, which makes the development of the Permanent Joint Council virtually the only guarantee that the process will continue.

Russia and the NATO members even differ over the order in which they will tackle most sensitive issues, Nassauer added. Russia favours a “top-down” approach in which the most politically sensitive issues are discussed first. NATO prefers the “bottom- up” method of establishing agreement on non-provocative topics before moving on to nuclear security or the Balkans.

Either way, Nassauer said, the important thing will be to address the controversial topics within the context of a stronger Joint Council with a fully-developed working structure. Otherwise, he warned, a half-hearted Joint Council “itself might be a means of recreating conflict in Europe” by lacking the authority to defuse tensions as they arise.