Details

It has already become commonplace among politicians and experts to dub the present-day state of world affairs as turbulence. We have witnessed the erosion of various pillars and institutions of the post-Cold War order and it remains largely unclear what contours the next ‘critical juncture’ in the system of international relations might have. Europe is one of the epicentres of these difficult questions.

The conflict in Ukraine has already become a protracted challenge and a bleeding wound of all-European security. The UK’s Brexit decision has pushed the united Europe into a qualitatively new, never-before-seen dynamic The election of Donald Trump has posed unprecedented questions about the immediate future of the Trans-Atlantic unity. On top of all, the migration crisis has strengthened populist and radical political forces all over Europe. The whole world is now watching what results the upcoming elections in France, the Netherlands and Germany will produce.

Against this background, the EU has adopted a new version of its Global Strategy and overhauled the European Neighbourhood Policy. The two documents declare some new principles of the EU’s policies in the eastern neighbourhood, but how will these principles be implemented amid the global turbulence? How synergetic will the ‘division of labour’ between EU institutions and individual member states be? What are the prospects for the EU’s Russia policy and how will it impact the in-between states? How are the past and emerging elements of the EU’s eastern policies seen in Belarus? What contributions to all-European security and cooperation can Belarus and other countries in eastern Europe realistically make?

The panel discussion will explore these questions by offering political and expert perspectives.

Minsk Dialogue Background

The Minsk Dialogue (MD) was launched in March 2015 as a Track-II (non-governmental) diplomacy platform with a focus on international relations and security in Europe and Eurasia. The initiative’s rationale was to create an expert-level platform for open and high-quality international discussions beyond geopolitical divides about the most challenging pan-European issues. Up to date, seven successful and well attended international conferences have taken place within the MD framework, which gathered in Minsk leading experts from the EU, Russia, Eastern European countries and the USA, as well as representatives of international organisations and the diplomatic community. Each conference was addressed by high-level officials: the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belarus and his deputies, the Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office in Ukraine and in the Trilateral Contact Group, members of the Eurasian Economic Commission, Alternate Secretary General of the Central European Initiative, the Head of the EU Delegation in Belarus, and others. In-between bigger international conferences, Minsk Dialogue Briefings and situational analysis and forecasting sessions are held.