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Central Europe and the New EU Agenda at German Institute for Economic Research in Berlin

October 13th, 2014
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News from Berlin - On October 10th 2014, a conference was co-organized by the Slovak Presidency of the Visegrád Group and the three think tanks: the Berlin-based DIW, the Bratislava-based CEPI and the Warsaw-based demosEUROPA. The conference was held under the name “Central Europe and the new EU agenda” and was focused on 10 years of Visegrád countries in the European Union. Discussions were held from the points of view of the invited speakers, including Peter Javorčík (State Secretary, Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic), Rainer Münz (Head of Research and Knowledge Center, Erste Group Bank AG, Vienna), Milan Nič (Director of Central European Policy Institute (CEPI), Bratislava) and Paweł Świeboda (President of demosEUROPA – Centre for European Strategy, Warsaw). The conference was chaired by Constanze Stelzenmueller, from The German Marshall Fund of the United States in Berlin.

State Secretary, Mr Javorčík spoke about the impact of European membership for Slovakian development since 2004. He summarized this impact as positive, partly because of the Euro adoption in 2009. The second topic of discussion was concentrated on a possible gas problem for Slovakia caused by the Ukraine crisis, as well as the possible solution of Ukraine stable country institutions, civil society, human rights respect, etc. Other topics had a monetary nature, and the State Secretary spoke about introducing the Euro as a currency to Slovakian neighbours. He outlined that, from the position of a Slovak citizen, the necessity for exchange to the Czech crown is quite a disturbing thought. He closed the case, stating that monetary policy is absolutely in the hands of Slovakia’s neighbours.

The second question from the conference chairman was about the Russian sanctions and how reasonable these might be. He pointed out the different perspectives of Slovakian relations with the Russian Federation and the relative absence of bad historic experiences with Russia, in comparison to some European countries. In the end, he emphasized for a second time the necessity for Ukraine to support in the long term.

The second guest was Mr. Swieboda, president of demosEuropa. His goal was to outline the European impact on Poland since 2004. In his opinion, one of the impacts for Poland was an acceleration of development when Poland overtook the Hungarian economy. Mr. Swieboda attributed this to a successful application of the “German Model” for the Polish economy. Also, he pointed out, that in comparison, Central Europe has a better position than some other European countries. Central Europe is in this position mostly because of the sector of Information Technology for example, Microsoft recently moved to Warsaw.

One of the chairman’s questions was naturally about the monetary situation in Poland. Mr. Swieboda stated that because Poland decided not to adopt the Euro shortly after entry to EU, this was then a trap for them, because later when the financial crisis came, it was not possible to keep a focus on Euro-adoption. Poland still use their own national currency. He also highlighted the advantages of this, saying that sometimes it is more favourable for the country not to join the currency and that euro adoption will be relevant when the Euro zone resolves its domestic economic problems.

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The Head of Research and Knowledge Center and Erste Group Bank AG of Vienna, Rainer Münz was involved in the panel discussion’s speeches. The Erse Group Bank Ag was founded in 1819 as the "First Austrian Savings Bank" and it was one of the major providers of financial service in central and Eastern Europe. During his speech Münz underlined that for the Visegrád group there are still several economic and financial issues. In general, the population that took part in European Integration in 2004 was initially not satisfied regarding this change and after some time they accepted the integration and started to experience growth. This change brought a different perception of regional integration: before the regional integration regarded the north and the south of Europe, but nowadays it is focusing more on East and West countries of Europe. This is mostly due to the fact that West European countries move their enterprises to the East in order to find a cheap labour force, but if this situation is not longer accepted, the only way to increase higher wages is through the formation of human capital. Unfortunately, in Central and Eastern Europe we do not have Universities on the same level of information as the Western Europe. The solution can be seen in the creation of new good and of new companies able to maintain themselves in the Eastern region.

After his speech took word Milan Nič, Director of Central European Policy Institute in Bratislava, who stressed that Visegràd countries have currently substantial experience in co-ordinating their positions and activities within NATO and the EU regarding political-security issues. Nič joined in writing a letter, with the four Prime Minister of Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, addressed to Herman Van Rompuy, President of the European Council, ahead of the EU summit in December 2013, which addressed further development of the Common Security and Defence Policy, and they rolled for a new impetus for a practical co-operation between the EU and NATO. This means that also Austria could be involved, which is not part of the NATO, but plays an important role in the EU's CSDP operation in the Western Balkans and contributes personnel to the NATO-led KFOR mission in Kosovo.

At the end of the talk there were time for questions from members of the audience, so the last half an hour consisted of conversation and a few interesting responses. This was not even the end of the discussion, which continued during the lunch time, where everyone had an opportunity to ask speakers about the specific problems on a personal basis. This conference also illustrated the potential of Visegrad cooperation and its importance of agenda coordination inside European Union.

The full program of the event:

http://www.cepolicy.org/events/central-europe-and-new-eu-agenda

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