2023-06-27 11:31:03
The former Foreign Minister and current dean of the Paris School of International Affairs (PSIA), the ‘Siences Po’, Arancha Gonzalez Laya, he went to Barcelona this Monday to participate in the master’s graduation ceremony of the Barcelona Institute of International Studies (IBEI). In this interview with EL PERIÓDICO DE CATALUNYA, from Grupo Prensa Ibérica, he analyzes the main focuses of international news.
Some analysts interpret the insurrection of the group Wagner as the beginning of the end for Putin. How can this action affect the future of Russia?
What happened shows weakness, vulnerability and an inability to control what is most sacred when you are at war, which is your military apparatus. Although on the other hand it is not surprising because Putin has put the military apparatus partly in the hands of a group of mercenaries. I agree that it is the beginning of the end for Putin with what that implies of uncertainty. But the myth of Putin’s invincibility has ended.
Already Ukraine?
What we are seeing and have been seeing for a few months, but now it has been shown in all its harshness, is that all that glitters is not gold. In autocracies, which make us believe that everything is strong and solid, in reality everything is much more liquid than we imagine. And what we see now is that in the middle of a war there is dissent within the Russian military apparatus. That may be good news for the Ukrainians and for those of us who believe that this war should end as soon as possible with the return of the occupied territories to Ukraine, but it may also have unforeseeable consequences if Putin finds himself isolated, if he sees himself vulnerable. He can give a rudder, he can try to scare with everything he has, including the nuke. The most important thing is to be prepared, both in Ukraine and in all the countries that we are helping Ukraine, we must be very clear about the response strategies.
The war in Ukraine is already 16 months old. Is there a risk that the population of the allied countries will begin to show symptoms of fatigue that will end up refusing to continue providing economic and military aid?
It is a risk that many have been announcing almost since the beginning of the war. But the truth is that the citizen understands where is good and where is evil, where is the victim and where is the aggressor. All the opinion polls say so. In the one from the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), from just two weeks ago, the citizens of 12 EU countries are very clear in the clear support they want their governments to continue giving to Ukraine and also in the firmness they want to with Russia. And the best that those of us who want to continue supporting Ukraine in this conflict, which may last for a while, can do is explain to the citizen what is at stake, which is nothing other than the EU.
On July 11 and 12 the summit of the I’LL TAKE in Vilnius. Some countries, mainly on the eastern flank of the Alliance, would like Ukraine to get a formal invitation to join the club at this meeting, but Stoltenberg has already ruled it out. In return, there is a commitment to show some kind of progress. What should be offered to kyiv?
The most important thing for Ukraine now are concrete guarantees of security and support in its defense. That’s what you need right now. Not generic commitments, as was done in previous summits, where too much room for interpretation was left. And I think that the Secretary General is working on this with the members of NATO.
And regarding the supply of weapons, should there be some red line? First it was said that tanks would not be sent and finally they were sent, and now there is a debate about combat planes.
This setting red lines, unless we are very firm in respecting them, is not very helpful. It is more prudent to explain that we are going to continue supporting Ukraine for as long as it takes and with the means that it takes. The only red line that we are not going to cross, and we already set it from the beginning, is to enter the war. That is the only line that we have been very clear that we were not going to cross. Unless, of course, there is an attack on NATO space.
The celebration of the general elections in Spain on July 23, can it affect or harm in any way the current presidency of the EU that will start next Saturday?
On European issues, I think there is a fair amount of consensus within Spain about the importance, especially in these moments of political and geostrategic ups and downs in the world, that the two major parties are capable of promoting a shared agenda. And, on the other hand, this is not the first time that Spain presides over the EU. It is the fifth. This is very shot in our country. It is not the first time that a presidency coincides with an electoral process. It happened in France with the 2022 elections. Countries are prepared for this. What would be very important is that the results of the elections were clear so that a government could be formed quickly and get down to work.
One of the declared objectives of this presidency was the signing and ratification of the EU-Mercosur Trade Agreement during the summit between the Twenty-seven and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) on July 17 and 18 in Brussels, but the reluctance from France and other countries, it seems that they are not going to make it possible…
This is a necessary agreement for Europe because now it is not just a trade agreement, it is the expression of a geopolitical will at a time when there is a very strong east-west division, but there are also cracks in the north-south relationship. It is a way of consolidating a north-south relationship that is fundamental for the EU, because it is the terrain where the EU can express its own geopolitical space. And it is a way to bring more resilience to the European economy. That would help at this time to obtain alternative sources of raw materials, markets that help us deconcentrate from others on which we are more dependent. And it is also a very interesting space for promoting joint commitments, such as the commitment to climate change and the protection of biodiversity, where the Mercosur countries and Brazil in particular have a lot to say.
Indeed, the president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva He has expressed his discomfort at the sanctions included in the agreement in case of non-compliance.
The trade agreement contains in all its dimensions disciplines in the event that the terms of the agreement are not complied with, in the event that Mercosur does not comply with them and in the event that the European Union does not comply with them either. There are some for unfair trade, when international conventions to which both parties are signatories are not complied with, and there are some in the case of biodiversity. I wouldn’t put too much emphasis on that. It is not an anti-Brazil clause, it is a clause in favor of the protection of biodiversity in which I believe that both parties are committed.
Another of Spain’s priorities is to achieve more efficient and coordinated management of migration and asylum processes. Recently, a tragic shipwreck in the waters of the Ionian Sea has once again put the immigration policy of the UE. Should the Twenty-seven continue to outsource border control to countries with governments of dubious democratic quality such as Turkey, Morocco or Tunisia?
What is happening is a sign of the insufficiency of the EU migration policy. Much more progress needs to be made in the fight against clandestine human trafficking networks, and that only works if it is done at the EU level because the networks are multi-country and because intelligence from all the countries and agencies that go to even be able to answer judicially about these people. More European Union is needed in the management of relations with the countries of origin and transit. It is clear that many of these countries are not democracies in the European style and usage, but that cannot prevent us from working with them. Migration must also be better organized because what we are seeing in Europe, including our country, is that we need contributions from migrants to keep our economy running. This is something that Minister Escrivá does very well, working precisely with countries of origin and transit. And lastly, I believe that progress must also be made on the issue of European solidarity so that it is not only the EU’s external border countries that assume the responsibility and burden of managing immigration.
A few months ago, the French president, Emmanuel Macrongenerated a stir by asking the EU to maintain a different voice from the US in its dispute with China in the context of the conflict with Taiwan, something that some have interpreted as meaning that the EU should bet on becoming a third superpower.
I think Macron expressed, in a perhaps slightly clumsy way, the feeling of the European citizen. According to the ECFR poll, Europeans stand for three things: you have to be firm with Russia, you have to be nuanced about China and you have to be very realistic about the United States. Somehow, citizens are expressing that they feel that the relationship with China is complex, it cannot be summarized in a single vertex. If China accounts for 32% of the world’s CO2 emissions, we need to work with China to reduce its emissions. If 50 countries in the world are so over-indebted that they are almost bankrupt right now and part of this debt is in Chinese hands, we have to work with China. But the citizens also understand that we have a rivalry problem included in the military field. Now, in the case of Taiwan, the European position is very clear and has two parts: one, respect for the ‘one China’ policy and, two, that the EU does not accept the change of the status quo by force. It is also true that it is in our interest to work to maintain that status quo. Do not make gestures that could give the impression that you are questioning yourself.
On June 27, as dean of Sciences Po in Paris, she will award an honorary doctorate to Angela Merkel for being one of the political personalities who has contributed the most to the construction of Europe since the Cold War. Is her legacy at risk in the face of the advance that the extreme right is experiencing in the EU?
With its lights and its shadows, its legacy must serve us as a bit of inspiration for the construction of the EU of the future. I would summarize it in three words, which are the ones I am going to use in my message in his honorary doctorate: commitment, resilience and values. These are three fundamental elements that the EU needs to move forward. The EU cannot advance without commitments, starting with the Franco-German commitments, which is one of the reasons why we recognize their work, their tireless work to always find a compromise between France and Germany, the core of the European Union. Resilience, because it is what we need now if we want to build a stronger Europe. And values, because we have to make sure that they are respected within the EU. The values of democracy, respect for human rights, diversity, tolerance,… that is the basis of the European Union.
The European Political Community will hold its third meeting in Granada in October. Is it going to end up consolidating itself as an international actor?
The European Political Community, which is the great photograph of all European countries facing Russia and Belarus, is the expression of geopolitical Europe. Of a Europe that needs to build spaces to protect the security of its citizens, its infrastructures, its trade, its energy supply. I see an interest in the countries that compose it. I think it is very important for Spain to consolidate this community at the Granada summit and it has to do so because each of the previous presidencies has managed to give it a plus of consolidation.
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