Greece is preparing a “Balkan Entente” inside the European Union

After the 1st of January 2007 a new challenge occurred for Bucharest politicians and this is the strategic positioning inside the European Union. Interests’ and likes’ and dislikes’ diversity of “the 27” make necessary the approach from power poles’ point of view. Romania has no lack of match makers. We do have an over 20 million consumers market and the power of tipping the scales in the decision process form Brussels in the qualified majority system. Greece’s concrete offer is the most recent one. The most common economical interests and the mostly identical political positions are the premises for a Balkan power pole inside European Union funding to become a reality.
Karolos Papoulias, Greece’s President has been visiting Bucharest last week and the message was pretty clear: the “excellent” relations between these two states must be turned into good accounts inside European Union.
Papoulias has launched in public the idea of an alliance between Greece, Bulgaria and Romania inside the European Union shortly before coming to Bucharest. “The Balkan countries must make themselves heard inside the decision process of European Union”, said Papoulias in an interview for the Bulgarian press agency Focus. In Bucharest, Prime Minister Calin Popescu-Tariceanu declared that Romania and Greece, as EU members, can become a really strong voice in the south-eastern part of Europe in order to coordinate their position inside European agenda. Papoulias emphasized the fact that Romania, Bulgaria and Greece are already a nucleus for this part of Europe.

Common targets
After meeting with Traian Basescu, the president of Greece has pointed out a series of sensitive elements from the European level on which Romania and Greece agree: continuing the process of EU extension in West Balkans, solving the Kosovo problem with a solution accepted also by Belgrade and assuming the environment protection agenda proposed by German presidency.
Romania and Greece have a common interest in European Union extension in West Balkans because there is a great need of stabilizing the area and eliminating the conflicts through making it profitable. The war experience from Yugoslavia has brought a lot of damages, including to Romanian and Greek economy and has lead to blocking the regional infrastructures. West-European politicians have established that a “reflection period” is more than necessary after Romania’s and Bulgaria’s adhesions due to the social dissatisfaction. This would be a period of time during which no extension will be made. They hope that during this period of time they will reform the decision process through a new treaty. Romania and Bulgaria can work together in order to shorten this period.
In a one year ago statement, president Papoulias has shown that Romania’s and Bulgaria’s adhesion must not be the end of the extension, but “the beginning of a new integration cycle”. “If a lasting peace inside Europe is wanted, then Balkan countries must also be integrated sooner or later”, said Papoulias, quoted by AFP.
The first candidate is Croatia which is in a full negotiation process. The attention is paid more and more towards Serbia which is looking forward to sing a negotiation agreement.

Kosovo state
Serbia is in the close-up due to the fact that the community is trying to finalize Kosovo province statute which is populated mostly by Albanians. This province is under Belgrade’s sovereignty and it is also managed by UN. Martti Ahtisaari, UN’s mediating person has released a solution at the beginning of this month according to which the people from Kosovo will obtain their independence under international supervision. This solution is very disputed by Serbia. “We sustain a solution which can be accepted by both sides, no matter how much time this would take”, said Karolos Papoulias in Bucharest. Romania and Greece have the same approach for this Kosovo solution, and this is possible maybe not because of an orthodox sympathy. According to BBC, in the meeting of EU countries’ Foreign Affairs Ministers from last week, Spain, Greece, Romania and Bulgaria have requested a solution for Kosovo which an be accepted bi Serbia also, fearing that otherwise the secession tendency from their territories will be encouraged.

Turkey – Cyprus equation
Greece has found in Romanian a real support even for the conflict between Cyprus and Turkey. The adhesion negotiations of European Union with Turkey have been interrupted because Ankara does not accept Cyprus vessels and airships in their own seaports and airports. Greece is a natural ally of Cyprus because and it is requesting some penalties over Turkey. Traian Basescu said that Turkey can become a EU member when it will reach all the necessary standards, but he also mentioned the fact that the adhesion negotiations with Ankara must continue.
One of the few dispute points in Romania and Greece relationships is the Black Sea politics. Athens was skeptical about the Bucharest political offensive on this area. The at Black Sea Dialog and Partnership Forum one year ago Greece has sent representatives from the “second echelon”, while all the other countries has sent their presidents. Greece had a reaction to the European Unions initiative of developing alternative energy lines. At the beginning of this month Russia, Greece and Bulgaria have finalized the agreement concerning the construction and administration of the oil pipe Burgas - Alexandroupolis. This pipe will strengthen the Russian monopoly on hydrocarbon distribution in this area of Europe, projects like Nabucco or Constanta – Trieste being really affected. Three Russian companies will own together 51% participation in the administrating council of this pipe, the rest being divided between Bulgaria and Greece. The strategic target of this pipe is to take a roundabout way because Bosporus and Dardanelles are really congested.

Economical offensive
From the economical point of view the collaboration seems to be flawless. Approximately 3.000 companies with Greek capital are registered in Romania, and the total volume of investments reaches over 3 billion euros. More than that, many Greek businesses are coming through a third nation company, which means that the figures are larger.
Being invited to a business forum of Commerce and Industry Chamber Karolos Papoulias said that Romania is the country where are the biggest investments that Greece has ever done abroad. “Greece is one of the most important foreign investors from Romania, occupying the ninth place as investments volume, having 3.63 % of total foreign investments”, decalred Jose Iacobescu, vice-president of Commerce and Industry Chamber. The most important fields where they have invested are: telecommunications (OTE and Cosmote), banking system (Alpha Bank, Egnatia Bnak, Emporiki Bank, Piraeus Bank), ensuring (Interamerican), IT (Intrarom ), panification (Loulis Mill), metallurgy (Sometra Copsa Mica) and food industry (Gregory’s and Everest). The Greek banks already have over 260 branches and over 6.000 employees all over the country.The great presence of Greek investors in Romania is more than important, due to the fact that Greece has had the initiative of starting a special program for economy’s development inside the Balkans. Petros Doukas has explained that this strategic partnership as a consequence of the fact that Greece wants to develop vertical infrastructure highways for Romania-Bulgaria axis.

Balanced commerce
The commercial trades between Romania and Greece have overrun 1 billion euros and they are still rising. Mircea Toader, the director of Economy and Commerce Ministry said that there are strong premises which could lead to doubling the commercial trades’ volume between these two countries for the next few years.
The latest statistics are showing that the Romanian-Greek trades have reached 801.96 million euros in the first ten months of the year. Exports were about 415.39 million euros to Greece and the imports’ value has reached 386.66 million euros. II