Relationship With Russia
Russia has voiced concerns over the Eastern Partnership, seeing it as an attempt to expand the European Union's “sphere of influence” in the quest for oil. Russia has also accused the EU of putting undue pressure on Belarus by suggesting it might be marginalised if it follows Russia in recognising the independence of the Georgian breakaway regions South Ossetia and Abkhazia. “Is this promoting democracy or is it blackmail? It's about pulling countries from the positions they want to take as sovereign states”, Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has asked.
Sweden, the co-author of the Eastern Partnership project together with Poland, rejected Mr Lavrov's position as “completely unacceptable”.
“The Eastern Partnership is not about spheres of influence. The difference is that these countries themselves opted to join”, Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt said at the Brussels Forum. The EU's position on Georgia is not ‘blackmail’ but “is about upholding the principles of the EU and international law, which Russia should also be respecting”, he added.
November 2009 President Dmitry Medvedev dismissed the Eastern Partnership as useless: “Frankly speaking, I don't see any special use (in the program) and all the participants of this partnership are confirming this to me”. However a few days later Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Russia does not rule out joining the EU's Eastern Partnership programme.
Russia keeps a stand of opposition towards EPP. For instance, after Warsaw Summit 2011 of EPP, Putin pointed that regarding economic crisis in EU, probably Ukraine would not join EU; instead of joining to EU, Putin offered Russia - Ukraine relationship which provides more competitive and productive economic process.
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