RIAC Report #16
The dramatic developments in Ukraine in 2014 have once again demonstrated the relevance of the cooperative crisis management tools and mechanisms of the OSCE.
Issues of strengthening and reforming the OSCE are once again part of the European agenda.
The 40th anniversary of the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe represents an important milestone in the development of the organization and provides an occasion for a frank discussion about the problems ...
... Jabarov
, First Deputy Head of the Russian Federation Committee on International Affair; and
Ivan Soltanovsky
, Director of the European Cooperation Department at Russian Foreign Ministry.
Reports were made by
Andrey Zagorsky
, department head at RAS Institute ... ... crises and should remain an actor within practical politics. The "Helsinki+40" project is a platform for discussing international security and scenarios for building a new security architecture.
The seminar was part of the
OSCE PA project
timed ...
... about the future of the organisation.
Andrei Vladimirovich, what’s your view of the OSCE’s anti-crisis potential at this moment? Is the organisation capable of playing the role of the main instrument for preventing and resolving crises in Europe?
The choice of instruments at the OSCE’s disposal for responding to crisis situations in Europe is quite broad. It’s a lot more impressive than it was in the 1990s, when the Organisation often had to improvise but at the same time played ...
... behavior in that particular field. That “sine qua non” requirement on the part of the West, as a matter of principle hotly disputed by the socialists, developed into a healthy and frank discussion on each other’s merits on the road to European and international security. While diplomatic civility was never abandoned, the sometimes acrimonious recrimination allowed participants to show clearly and without veils what each of them considered to be the state of play and the necessary measures to improve ...
... particular importance in the context of the Ukrainian crisis in 2014.
Trial by Ukraine
The dramatic events in Ukraine notably forced a reassessment of the issue of European security. The practically non-existent probability of armed conflict in this part of Europe turned into a reality in a matter of weeks. The most advanced mechanisms of international security in the region, based on the decision-making of the limited number of countries, failed. Stepping-up OSCE activity appeared to be natural measure to provide at least some international monitoring of the security situation in
different ...
