Category: Country

2002, Ukraine

Ukraine in 2002

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Ukraine in 2002

Sarah Birch

Introduction

In the area of today’s Ukraine there is a tradition of foreign rule and of resistance to it. Before the Soviet period Ukraine had had only fleeting and unstable experience of autonomous statehood. In the twentieth century Ukraine was formed in stages, following the First and Second World Wars, on the ruins of collapsed empires. Ukraine gained territorial integrity for the first time as part of the Soviet Union, and won autonomy as a sovereign state only following the Soviet collapse in 1991. This fitful formation has left a number of social and cultural marks on the republic:

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2001, Europe, European Union

Eastern Europe’s Churches and the Challenge of E.U. integration

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Eastern Europe’s Churches and the Challenge of EU Integration

Jonathan Luxmoore

Introduction

Westerners generally do not realise how central a foreign policy issue the question of EU membership has been in Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. It is the nexus around which all economic and political discussion has taken place. There are no significant differences between the centre-right and the former communists (the centre-left) on the issue; only some fringe parties are opposed to EU membership. The candidate countries watch each other like hawks, especially in the context of EU Commission reports on the extent of their readiness to join. Visiting EU ministers are always asked same first question: ‘When do you think we’ll be allowed to join?’

Five post-communist countries have been negotiating membership since March 1998: the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Poland and Slovenia (in addition to Cyprus and Malta). Five others have opened negotiations since – Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovakia – and some of these are now catching up. The Nice summit in December 2000 agreed that enlargement could take place from 1 January 2003, and Poland hopes to complete the process in time for the European Parliament elections in 2004.

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2001, Europe (general), European Union

EU Expansion: a Mainly Political Perspective

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EU Expansion: a Mainly Political Perspective

Ken Medhurst

Before the fall of communism in 1989 there had been three successive EU enlargements which expanded membership from the original six countries (the Benelux countries, the Federal German Republic, France and Italy) to include a total of twelve. These enlargements involved Britain, Denmark, Ireland, Greece, Portugal and Spain.

The collapse of communism in principle created a wholly new situation entailing the possibility of a major eastward expansion. The reunification of Germany and the consequent incorporation of the former GDR into the EU was a harbinger of subsequent opportunities and difficulties.

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2001, Europe, Europe (general)

Peace and Reconciliation in Europe

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Peace and Reconciliation in Europe

Richard Seebohm

Introduction

I have spent the last three years as Representative in Brussels of the Quaker Council for European Affairs, lobbying the European institutions on the subjects of peace, human rights and economic justice. One of our outcomes was a club of 17 NGOs with whom we set up the European Peacebuilding Liaison Office. It began work in January 2001, with the task of information-sharing in order to link the non-violent conflict resolution capabilities of the NGOs with the evolution of European Union policies for crisis management.

It is one thing to avert crises, but quite another to solve the problem of enabling people who have been intent on destroying each other to learn once more to live alongside each other.

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2000, North Caucasus

The North Caucasus: Working for Peace and Healing

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The North Caucasus: Working for Peace and Healing

Davin Bremner, Leonora Lowe and Maksim Shevelev work for International Alert*, a non-governmental organisation committed to the just and peaceful transformation of violent conflicts.

Roswitha Jarman is a counselling psychologist working on healing after violence, and particularly with traumatised children, among Chechen refugees in Ingushetia.

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2000, Europe, Europe (general)

Changes in Europe and Britain

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Changes in Europe

Europe today faces unprecedented challenges. The euphoria of 1990 and the end of the Cold War gave way to new problems: unemployment, threats to the environment, narrow nationalism, vast numbers of displaced people and new restrictive asylum legislation.

Enlargement of the European Union brings its own dilemmas – more countries and diverse cultures means compromise and consensus.

  • How open will the E.U. be, as it expands and deepens?
  • Will monetary union bring growing prosperity?
  • Will there be safeguards to ensure fair trade for all, rich and poor alike?

The search for new patterns of freedom and justice means a tremendous challenge for the churches, too. Can they help to create and maintain a truly democratic society?

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