EU agenda looks to talks in new year
Poland's governments did not meet ambitious goals set for 2001 as the country negotiates membership in the European Union (EU) and the most serious tests of political will and public opinion are yet to come in the new year, according to politicians and analysts.
Despite difficulties through 2001 under two different governments, officials in Brussels and Warsaw publicly remain upbeat about EU enlargement that includes Poland in 2004.
"Poland is not lagging with preparations," said an EU diplomat based in Warsaw. "It still has a realistic chance of joining the union in a big bang."
A "big bang" is officially expected in 2004 when 10 of the countries now in talks with the EU join. As the candidate country with the largest population and biggest economy, Poland is considered crucial to a successful enlargement. But of the 12 countries now in negotiations, only Bulgaria and Romania are further behind.
Poland did not make formal progress as foreign ministers from candidate countries and the EU met last week in Brussels during the last formal set of talks of the year.
"Poland simply cannot rely on its size and geopolitical importance to get it through these negotiations," said Heather Grabbe, research director at the London-based Center for European Reform. While it would be politically difficult to leave Poland out of an enlargement, other candidate countries are unwilling to wait and such a scenario is not impossible to consider, she said.
At the outset of the year, the Solidarity Election Action (AWS)-led government pledged to forge ahead in EU talks, setting an ambitious goal of closing 11 negotiation areas, or chapters, by the end of June; together AWS and its successor, the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) closed only eight for the entire year.
AWS, which won no seats in Parliament during September's elections, was often criticized for clinging to negotiation positions the EU could not accept, especially on questions of free movement of labor and land acquisition by foreigners. But SLD quickly ran into vocal opposition in the Sejm when it softened Poland's stance in those areas. The tensions culminated Friday in a vote of confidence called by opposition deputies on Foreign Minister Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz; the vote was after the Business Journal's deadline but Cimoszewicz was expected to survive.
The ongoing debate is likely to affect public opinion in the run-up to a 2003 Polish referendum on joining the political and economic bloc.
A European Commission survey conducted in October and released last week indicated that a referendum would have passed in Poland. But only 51% of Poles support enlargement, the survey found.
"There is a democratic process to be gone through," Grabbe said. "There is a lot of work to be done explaining what EU membership means, and what its costs and benefits are."
The costs and benefits are likely to become more readily apparent as Poland negotiates the financial aspects of membership, including highly political issues.
"We still have before us further stages in the negotiations that will be extremely delicate: I need only mention the chapters on the structural funds or agriculture," said European Commission President Romano Prodi in a speech last week, referring to price supports to farmers and infrastructure development money that the EU generously doles out among member states. Inclusion of 10 new candidates would force a reworking of formulas used to calculate these funds - possibly to the dismay of some current recipients.
Jeff Sparshott
