EurasiaNet Eurasia Insight - NATO Summit to Grapple with Afghanistan, Mull Membership for Georgia, Ukraine

EURASIA INSIGHT

NATO SUMMIT TO GRAPPLE WITH AFGHANISTAN, MULL MEMBERSHIP FOR GEORGIA, UKRAINE
Deborah B. Wild 3/31/08

US President George W. Bush departed Washington on March 31 on what promises to be a challenging diplomatic trip. The focal point of the journey is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in Bucharest, where he will seek to convince skeptical allies on the need for a troop buildup in Afghanistan and on the value of offering NATO membership to Georgia and Ukraine. Bush is also due to meet Russian leader Vladimir Putin for discussions on Eurasian security.

Over the past year, the radical Islamic insurgency in Afghanistan has gained new momentum, and it has reached the point where some experts believe the country’s reconstruction/democratization process is imperiled. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Meeting with foreign journalists in Washington on March 26, Bush discussed the stakes for NATO in Afghanistan, and urged alliance members to increase their commitment to Afghanistan’s stabilization.

"I believe we’ll have a successful summit," Bush said, referring to the April 2-4 gathering in the Romanian capital. "The definition of success is to make sure NATO stays relevant, and that we work in a collaborative fashion to deal with the threats of the 21st century and the opportunities of the 21st century.

"There’s no better opportunity to deal with the threats of terror than in Afghanistan," Bush continued. "So part of the mission -- part of our collective mission in Romania for the NATO meeting is to encourage people to take our obligations seriously. And the United States, to that end, will make it clear that we do take our obligations seriously. We’ve committed [3,200 additional] Marines."

While it would appear that Bush is most dissatisfied with Germany’s stance on Afghanistan, Bush said in an interview with the German newspaper Die Welt that he would not push to have Berlin send more troops to Kabul. "I want decisions that our partners can live with," Bush said in the interview. "Naturally I can see that some countries aren’t in a position right now to take on certain obligations."

During the Washington meeting with foreign journalists, Bush made a strong case for Georgia and Ukraine to receive a NATO membership action plan, or MAP, which would provide specific guidelines for membership. While the United States is a strong supporter of Georgia and Ukraine receiving MAPs at the Bucharest summit, many European members of the alliance oppose such action, including Germany, France, Span and Italy.

It is uncertain whether United States, which is bogged down in Iraq, and burdened with numerous other strategic issues, has the political capital necessary to convince its reluctant partners on the merits of offering MAPs to Tbilisi and Kyiv. Behind-the-scenes maneuvering may continue right up to the moment MAP decisions need to be made in Bucharest. Pro-MAP parties have engaged in an intensive lobbying effort. Recently admitted NATO members, including the Baltic States, Bulgaria, Romania, Poland, as well as Canada, have sent a letter to NATO headquarters in Brussels in support of Georgia and Ukraine. In addition, the newspaper Financial Times Deutschland reported that Bush made a personal phone call to German Chancellor Angela Merkel trying to swing the German government’s opinion.

"It is not over yet", says Levan Dutschidze, the Georgian Ambassador to Germany, especially given "the experience with the Baltic States, where the decision on their membership was made a day before or [during] the summit." He is having daily consultations with his German colleagues to show them that "Georgia is ready for the next step. We have done our homework; we have done more and better than was asked of us."

Officially Berlin cites problems within both countries as the reason for its unsupportive position: in Ukraine, a majority of the population does not support NATO membership; meanwhile in Georgia, the democratic credentials of President Mikheil Saakashvili’s government have taken a beating amid prolonged political turmoil in Tbilisi. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Despite their differences on many issues, both Saakashvili and his political opponents have strong desires for Georgia to gain a MAP during the NATO conclave in Bucharest. David Usupashvili, leader of the opposition Republican Party, argued that Georgia’s domestic political problems should not be sufficient grounds for stalling on a MAP offer. He believes that MAP is not just granted to one government, but to the entire country, where 77 percent of Georgians voted in favor of NATO membership, according to a plebiscite held last January.

At a meeting with German military commanders on March 1, Merkel, the German chancellor, noted that countries "entangled in regional and internal conflicts" cannot join NATO, German media outlets reported. Given Georgia’s unsettled disputes with its separatist-minded entities -- Abkhazia and South Ossetia -- Merkel, in effect, indicated that German support for Georgia’s MAP aspirations was out of the question.

Georgian diplomats, however, aren’t taking �no’ for an answer. "We know that with current conditions of conflicts [in South Ossetia and Abkhazia] we don’t have a perspective of becoming full-fledged NATO members," said Dutschidze. "But MAP is not membership � thus the conflicts should pose no obstacle for MAP."

On March 28, Saakashvili came out with new proposals designed to promote Abkhazia’s peaceful reintegration into Georgia, offering to create a Georgian-Abkhaz free economic zone, to ensure Abkhaz representation in the central administration, and to establish the post of vice president with the right to veto Abkhaz-related decisions.

The timing of the announcement was not a coincidence, said Giorgi Khutsishvili, director of the Tbilisi-based International Center on Conflict & Negotiation. It was to show that the Georgian government is serious about solving the conflicts ahead of the Bucharest summit, but also "to create a counterbalance to the enormous activity of Russia in order to prevent Georgia’s accession to NATO." Abkhaz de facto leader Sergey Bagapsh quickly rejected the proposal as "propaganda ahead of the NATO summit." Khutsishvili believes Moscow exerted pressure on Bagapsh to make an instant rejection. As a result, a substantive proposal will not receive due consideration, Khutsishvili lamented.

The Russian envoy to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, has sought to raise the stakes on the MAP issue. In an interview published in the German magazine Spiegel, Rogozin stated that if Georgia joins the Atlantic Alliance, it will "permanently lose" Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

NATO Secretary-General Jaap Hoop de Scheffer has stated that Russia does not enjoy a de facto veto over alliance membership decisions. Nevertheless, the negative impact of awarding MAPs to Georgia and Ukraine on NATO’s relationship with Russia is believed to be an underlying reason for opposition in Western Europe.

The NATO enlargement issue will undoubtedly be among the topics discussed during the planned Bush-Putin meeting in the Russian resort city of Sochi on April 6. Washington’s plan to install anti-missile systems in Poland and the Czech Republic figures to be a chief subject of discussion. Washington and Moscow have sparred in recent months on the need for anti-missile systems to be based in Central Europe. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Editor�s Note: Deborah B. Wild is a freelance journalist who divides her time between Bucharest, Rumania and Tbilisi Georgia.

The Central Eurasia Project aims, through its website, meetings, papers, and grants, to foster a more informed debate about the social, political and economic developments of the Caucasus and Central Asia. It is a program of the Open Society Institute-New York. The Open Society Institute-New York is a private operating and grantmaking foundation that promotes the development of open societies around the world by supporting educational, social, and legal reform, and by encouraging alternative approaches to complex and controversial issues.

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