Poland will not sign Eastern Partnership project for 2013 until talks with Moldova, Azerbaijan and Armenia are over

• Thursday, February 21, 17:47

 Poland is not going to put its signature under Eastern Partnership's new project for 2013 until the talks with Moldova, Azerbaijan and Armenia are completed, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said at a press conference in Gdansk following the meeting of the foreign ministers of 12 European countries.

According to Xinhua news agency, the Polish minister said that 1.5 bln EUR investments are needed to implement the project. If the agreement on Eastern Partnership is signed in 2013, possible controversy may arise in the future.    

The Swedish foreign minister, in turn, said that the work on the Eastern Partnership project is long and complicated and may be done by means of stage-by-stage measures only. 

The Eastern Partnership (EaP) is a project initiated by Poland and a subsequent proposal was prepared in cooperation with Sweden. It was presented by the foreign minister of Poland and Sweden at the EU's General Affairs and External Relations Council in Brussels on 26 May 2008. The Eastern Partnership was inaugurated by the European Union in Prague on 7 May 2009. The first meeting of foreign ministers in the framework of the Eastern Partnership was held on 8 December 2009 in Brussels. The Eastern Partnership is a forum aiming to improve the political and economic trade-relations of the six Post-Soviet states
of "strategic importance" - Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine with the European Union.