Visegrad Group: Alliance Against Russia and Germany:Dreamers

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The15th anniversary of the date, February, 15, 1991, when heads of Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia gathered in the Hungarian city of Visegrad to sign the Declaration on Cooperation was marked last week. Fifteen years later it can be said with confidence that this event has changed the history of Europe…

Visegrad's Spirit


Ancient town of Visegrad

The smal, quietl town of Visegrad is located an hour’s drive from the Hungarian capital, on the picturesque bank of the Danube River. Today it is a favourite rest stop for tourists, and between 1323 and 1350 it was the main residence of powerful Hungarian kings. During this period Hungary was a strategic regional center. Here, 1335 and in 1339 in Visegrad's Castle, in two famous meetings of three European governors - the kings of Poland, Bohemia (the modern Czech Republic) and Hungary, agreed upon close political and trading cooperation. The contracts, bearing their official seals determined the for many years further development of the region, and led to the formation of numerous political, economic and cultural connections among the peoples living there.
A century later, the union of Hungarians and Poles became a basis for formation of the united army which fought against the Turkish threat to Europe. And though. at the battle at Varna in1440 the Poles and Hungarians suffered defeat, they avenged themselves in 1683, under the banners of the famous, Polish King Yan III Sobieski, who crushed the Turks at the gates of Vienna. By that time the lands of Hungary, Czechia and Slovakia had become part of the Empire, and, subsequently, at the end of the 18th century, they were joined by parts of Poland. Hungarian, Czech, Slovak and Polish soldiers went into many battles under the Habsburg banners, until their last joint participation on the fields of WW I.
During the so-called "Cold War, " Czechoslovakia, today's Czechia and Slovakia, and also Poland and Hungary were members of two large organizations of the Communist bloc, the Council of Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA) and the Warsaw Treaty Organization (WTO). Thus, the centuries-old tradition of political, economic, military and cultural connections among these states was kept alive, despite the oppression of the Communist regime imposed by Moscow -.Interestingly, communications at the lowest level – those among ordinary people of these countries, were, sometimes even stronger than official relations among the ruling elites. Almost forgotten today is the heroic episode during the Hungarian revolt of 1956, when a Polish civilian plane arrived in Budapest, despite attack by the Soviet armies, carrying aboard donor blood collected by simple Poles specifically for the struggling Hungarians. The senior generation of Hungarians remembers to this day a the story, perhaps a legend;perhaps true, of the Polish girl student who lost her life, shot by a Soviet soldier, while fighting with a weapon in her hands on the streets of Budapest,.

The Communist Heritage

The Socialist camp collapsed as suddenly as a sand castle in 1989. The socialist governments of Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary were replaced by people, most of whom were sincere idealists desiring to get rid of the heritage of the recent gloomy past more quickly by joining the western political, economic and defensive structures. At that stage nobody in the Central Europe had yet thought seriously about regional cooperation.
At the same time, even after the collapse of the Council of Mutual Economic Assistance one economic factor continued to unite the countries of region - their common power infrastructures. In the Eighties, through the territories of Czechoslovakia and Hungary, the oil pipeline "Adria" was laid, through which it was possible to transport oil from Northern Africa and the Middle East, by way of the Omisalj terminal on the territory of modern Croatia. After the Croatian section of the pipeline was damaged at the beginning of the nineties, Russian oil was delivered to Western European and also Central European states through the Slovak and Hungarian sections of "Adria", which were connected to the Russian “Druzhba” pipeline. At the same time, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary continued receiving and transiting the Russian gas. Even now all the deliveries of gas from Russia to Europe are carried out through their territories, except those to Scandinavia and Greece. Dependence of the economy of the region on deliveries by the Russian energy carriers also continues. Ninety percent of natural gas consumed today by the Czech Republic and Slovakia, is of Russian origin. In Hungary it reaches about 80 %, and in Poland about 65%.
Thus, even after the collapse of the Communist bloc, it became obvious that the countries of Central Europe remain united by the common transportation infrastructure of the Russian energy carriers. It means preservation, to some extent, of their dependence on Moscow.
In addition Russia’s interest in the expansion of the oil and gas deliveries to Europe, it still aspires to keep and expand its influence on the internal political and economic situations in the countries of Central Europe. Understanding of the need to resist to this common "threat from the East," which came to most of the leaders of the countries in this region at the beginning of the Nineties, also became a consolidating factor at the regional level. The last bright display of the desire of Central Europe to energy independence from Moscow, was the Polish initiative on "collective energy security," announced in January 2006, to which we shall return later.

The First Steps Towards Cooperation


Vaclav Havel

As mentioned above, during first two years of a post-Communist epoch, the leaders of the Central European states did not consider regional cooperation seriously. As former inhabitants of the united Communist sphere, they hardly communicated with each other, and had no experience of cooperation in the fields of politics, economy, culture and security. The first person, who spoke about the necessity of such cooperation was Czechoslovak President Vaclav Havel, who called for the peoples of Central Europe to find the common formula of interaction while solving complicated issues in such areas as ecology, social security, culture, economy, politics and security.
Soon several practical steps toward realization of the Czechoslovak President’s idea were undertaken. On February, 15, 1991, Vaclav Havel, his Polish colleague Lech Walesa and Hungarian Prime Minister Joszef Antall met in Visegrad. The meeting resulted in the signing of a "Declaration on Co-operation Between the Republic of Poland, the Czechoslovak Federal Republic and the Republic of Hungary on the Path for Advancing Towards European Integration." The purpose of the Declaration was to consolidate efforts by the countries, which signed it, within the framework of the process of integration into the European Union’s structures. Among other things this also meant economical cooperation.
Later, in December 1992, in the Polish city of Krakow, based on this Declaration, the Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) was signed. It came into force on March 1, 1993. The signing of the Visegrad Declarations was received in the countries of Central Europe with enthusiasm. Politicians, intellectuals and the press hailed it as the revival of the spirit of the medieval Visegrad.
The name Visegrad Group was also offered by Vaclav Havel for the new union of Czechoslovakia, Poland and Hungary. Another name - the Visegrad Troika - was also used, referring to the fact that the structure of the group included three countries. Only two years later, in 1993, after Czechoslovakia split into two independent states, Czech republic and Slovakia, did the organization received its present name – "Visegrad Four" or V4.

A Period of Doubts

The formation of the mechanisms and culture of cooperation between the Visegrad states took some time and was accompanied by numerous ups and downs. At the initial stages even the question of the necessity of the union was raised. Doubts over the expediency of Visegrad cooperation were expressed, first of all, by the Czech Prime Minister, Vaclav Klaus (1992-97), today's President of the Czech Republic. As against Havel, the author of the idea of association, Klaus considered that his country had a special advantage on the ground at negotiations with the EU and did not need any regional structure. As a result of isolationist tendencies within the Czech government, in 1993 cooperation in the framework of the "Visegrad Group" was reduced considerably, before it had time to develop. Visegrad's historians up to this day call the initial stage of Vaclav Klaus's rule "a black stripe in the union's history".
Relations between its participants had grown so cold that even when Klaus appealed for support in his difficult negotiations with Berlin, it was rejected. More than cool relations between Prague and Bratislava,

Vaclav Klaus
caused both by a certain orientation of Czech diplomacy and the antidemocratic character of the Slovak regime headed by Vladimir Meciar (1992-1999), did not promote the strengthening of cooperation either. Thus, during Klaus and Meciar's rule, approximately during the years 1992-1997, the "Visegrad Group" actually existed only on paper. Some improvement of the situation began in 1995 with a warming up in relations between Warsaw and Prague. Even Klaus and his coterie, after getting their fingers burnt during the negotiations with Germany, realized the necessity of regional cooperation. They also realized that the Poles being focused on integration into NATO and the EU, due to their favorable geopolitical position, obviously would be in the center of the process of expansion of these structures. As a result of this "wonderful enlightenment", and the Polish-Czech rapprochement which followed it, during the second half of the Nineties a special term was even invented: the "Post-Visegrad Two".
Finally, the Czech Republic, and after it Slovakia and Hungary, despite historical, cultural and economic affinity to Austria and Slovenia, selected the union with Poland as a dominant position of their foreign policy. The reason was that Poland, being a geographically and demographically powerful state of the region, was willing and capable of speaking as an equal with the capitals of the leading European countries. Certainly, Slovenia and even Austria was no match for Poland in this situation, and that was extremely important from the point of view of the further development of the "Visegrad Group".

On the Way to Success

The really full-scale cooperation between Poland and the Czech Republic in the framework of the "Visegrad Group" was renewed only in June 1998, after the victory of the Czech social democrats (CSSD) in parliamentary elections. Simultaneously, the parliamentary elections of September 1998 in Slovakia led to the fall of Mechiar's antidemocratic government. In its turn, it pushed Bratislava to start full integration into a process of regional cooperation. Thus, after Vaclav Klaus and Vladimir Mechiar (the two leaders, who brought about the split of Czechoslovakia in 1993), left the political Olympus in Central Europe, the "Visegrad Group" again totaled four participants and was ready to stand up for its interests as a united front before NATO and the EU. By the way, in parallel, bilateral relations between Prague and Bratislava have improved. Finally the problems of partition of the former Czechoslovak property were solved in 2000.
In March 1999 the efforts of the "Visegrad Group" were crowned with success - Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic joined NATO. A year later, the head of the foreign policy departments of the three countries, Jan Kavan, Janos Martony and Bronislav Geremek, marked the anniversary of this event, having met in Budapest to sign a special declaration on the historical value of the process of NATO's expansion.
This joint declaration testified to the end of a period of isolationism in relations between the V4 members. It was obvious that Slovakia’s joining NATO was only a matter of time as Poland was patronizing it for many years. And, truly, Slovakia became a full member of the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance on March 24, 2004. And in less than two months, on May 1, 2004, all four "Visegrad Group" countries joined the ranks of the European Union.

"The Visegrad Group "in Action

Today the member-countries of the "Visegrad Group" carry out cooperation in various areas, such as culture, science and education, defense policy and the defense industry, economy (with special stress on the energy sector), development of infrastructure,


environment, the struggle against international terrorism, organized crime and illegal immigration, overcoming the consequences of acts of nature, visa control over the Schengen agreement, employment and social policy. Besides, on June 9, 2000 these four countries created a joint International Visegrad Fund, intended for the support of cultural, scientific and educational projects, exchange of youth delegations, development of tourism and cross-border cooperation. According to the agreement, beginning in 2003, each country annually donates 600 thousand euros to this fund.
In July 2005 the presidency of the V4 Group was occupied by Hungary, which replaced Poland. Currently Budapest applies maximum effort for an increase in the level of cooperation inside V4, both on internal issues of the Central European region, and on questions at the level of the EU and international community. In addition to all that significant stress is placed on attracting other countries, mainly in the eastern and southern regions of the continent (Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia), to participate in the work of the organization. In this connection there is quite a natural question concerning the direction of the future development of the Visegrad process.

Pending Expansion

Literally several months prior to the "Visegrad Group" countries joining the EU, in the spring of 2004, various analysts came out with assumptions according to which the Visegrad idea would not survive the next expansion of the European Union. A Czech political scientist, Jiri Pehe, Director of New York University in Prague, declared that the allegedly geopolitical ambitions of Poland, with its population of 40 million, are not meeting the interests of the less large Central European countries. The relative consent between the countries - members of the "Visegrad Group" was achieved, in Pehe's opinion, only due to one common overall aim - integration into NATO and the European Union. After achieving that, V4 should, according to his forecast, disappear from the stage.
However, the forecasts of Pehe and similar predictions of other analysts were not fulfilled. They overlooked one circumstance that during one and a half decades of the existence of Visegrad's idea it has gone through many crisis situations – the split of Czechoslovakia (1993), the Polish-Czech espionage scandal (2000) and dispute over so-called Benes Decrees (2002). And none of them was lethal to the "Visegrad Group". Moreover, in the geopolitical situation, which developed in Europe in 2004-2005 there was no reason whatsoever for the disintegration of the regional association, which became so firmly established. This situation does not cause in the V4 countries, and especially in Poland, any positive historical associations: Russia, full of imperial ambitions and gaining in strength, is pushing from the East, and a strong united Germany, which is already not hiding its revanchist moods too much, is looming from the West.
Under these conditions, the "Visegrad Group" not only abandoned any idea of self-dissolution, but, as already was mentioned, makes an effort to attract other countries from the eastern and southern regions of the continent to work with the organization.
For example, the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine was officially invited to the meeting of the V4 Ministers for Foreign Affairs (July 2005), which marked the beginning of Hungary's presidential period. Three months later, in October 2005, in Budapest a Ministerial conference on the Western Balkans took place, in which Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, participated along with representatives of Austria and Slovenia. These two countries conduct regular consultations with the V4 group on various questions on the European Union's agenda. This forum, which became permanent, even received an informal name - "V4+2 Framework". According to the statements of high-ranking diplomats of the "Visegrad Group", cooperation with these countries will proceed in 2006.
As a platform for V4 political expansion the already mentioned above Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) may be used, in which Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia participate as well as such countries as: Slovenia (1996), Romania (1997), Bulgaria (1999) and Croatia (2003).
And, at last, a real step on the way to expansion of the existing model of the Visegrad union can become the recent Polish initiative of "collective energy security", suggested in January 2006 by the head of the Polish government,

Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz
Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, during his voyage to the capitals of the V4 partners of Poland. The revival of the project of deliveries of Norwegian natural gas to Central Europe and the reduction of power dependence on Russia suggested by Marcinkiewicz can be tempting not only for the Visegrad countries, but also for Croatia and Ukraine. Their joining the gas project could pave the way for future expansion of an existing geographical framework of the "Visegrad Group".
In lobby interviews sources in the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs declare today that the V4 expansion process has already started, and it is unstoppable. In the near future negotiations on joining the group can start with EU countries such as Slovenia, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. An indirect testimony to the beginning of the process is the recently shown aspiration of the Latvian diplomats to classify their own country as a Central European state. Besides, in the more long-term future, Ukraine, Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro, Bulgaria, Romania and Moldova can also receive invitations to join the "expanded" V4. Even Belarus is on the list of potential members of the "Visegrad Group", as Warsaw still hopes that democratization will change the face of this state.
Thus, the construction of a new, expanded "Visegrad Group" has just started. However, even now it is possible to state with confidence, that if there would have been no historical meeting of Havel, Walesa and Antall on February 15, 1991 in ancient Visegrad, the entire current history of Europe would have been very different.