 Hello, everybody. Welcome. We're delighted to have you here. My name is John Hammery. I'm the president of CSS. And I'm also the president or the director of the Brzezinski Institute on Geostrategy. And we're delighted to be able to, under the auspices of the Brzezinski Institute, to feature Carl Bildt today in our statesman's laureate program. First of all, before we start, to say we have a policy here when we have outside groups that meet with us, that we begin with a little safety briefing. I am the responsible safety officer, which means if anything happens, you're going to follow my directions. We've got exits right back here and the exit stairs down in that corner. And nothing's going to happen, but just follow me if we have to. We're going to go down the stairs. We're going to go across the street. We'll meet under that great big beautiful tree, and I'll see if we can get ice cream brought over or something. Thank you all for being here. And we're delighted to have you. I'm especially pleased to welcome Carl Bildt. I've had the privilege of working with Carl for 15 years, and it's been the most unusual experience in my life to have a foreign minister or former prime minister come, and he spends all his time rummaging through my bookshelf seeing what he can take, because he wants to read it. He's the most unusual intellect that I've had a chance to experience. He has a driving intellect, an insight. He's got a consciousness of how the dynamic in the world. So literally, we said he's got to be at the front of the list on somebody who would share with us his insights about a rather dramatic place in the world these days. He agreed that as you saw his title of the speech, Europe surrounded not by a ring of friends, but by a ring of fire. I think that's emblematic of the forward-leaning character of Carl Bildt as a foreign policy intellect. I first met him, actually, when he was a special envoy in the Balkans and was instrumental in helping to bring peace arrangement in the Balkans. While it's unfinished business, it wouldn't have gotten anywhere to this stage without Carl's leadership. And so today, I think we've asked him if he would take some time to talk with us about the tumult that we see in Europe, and I think there's no one who would be better positioned to help us think this through than probably, in my view, one of the most strategic intellects that I know in Europe. And so could I ask you with your applause to please welcome Carl Bildt. It was a pleasure. It was a pleasure. Thanks, John, and thanks for those marvelous words of introduction. It's been a pleasure over the years to work together with you and all of the talent that has always been here at the CSIS on all of the more or less pressing issues of the rapidly changing ages. And then, of course, it is a true honor to say something in a lecture in the name of Spig Brzezinski and to be part of the work of the Institute that is now set up in his name here at the CSIS. He is truly one of the leading strategic thinkers of the West in our time. Perhaps natural, if we know where he came from, that he's been thinking both in the more classical geopolitical terms, but also seeing the larger battles of ideas that have been so important. I remember way back when I was at university, his standard book, The Soviet Block, was something we all read. It's still in my bookshelf. The Soviet Block is not in the world, but the book is still a relevant piece of academic work. Without any sort of nostalgia of those days, I think it has become common to note that they, from a purely analytical point of view, were probably somewhat easier. There was, particularly if we see it in the European perspective, there was one evil empire. And policy was a question of containing and of sometimes having a confrontation with this particular empire. Then, of course, to the surprise of most of the analytical community, we saw the empire collapsing under the weight of its own failures and its own contradictions. And suddenly we were confronted with the task of building what was referred to as the time as a new word order. The decades that have passed since then have been challenging in many respects. The Balkan Wars can be mentioned. But I would still argue that they have probably been among the very best decades of mankind ever. That certainly goes when you look at global figures for reduction in mortality, for increases in lifespan, for millions and millions, hundreds of millions of people lifted out of poverty. And it applies perhaps even more, primarily in political terms, to Europe. The European Union undertook the historical enlargement with 10 nations and 100 million people that secured open societies and open economies to half of Europe that had been denied those for several generations. We have finally managed, or did finally manage, to take Europe out of that long nightmares of wars, of destruction, of dictatorships and divisions which started in the fateful summer of 1914. It was little more than 10 years ago, in 2003, that the European Union in its first ever security strategy, rather boldly stated that, quote, Europe has never been so prosperous, so secure, nor so free. The violence of the first half of the 20th century has given way to a period of peace and stability unprecedented in European history. That was the mood of those days, not that long ago. And it wasn't wrong at the time. It was also in 2003 that the European Union set out to develop what we called its European neighborhood policy, E&P, for short. Enlargement had transformed the countries that had the possibility to become a member, that's fairly obvious. But the influence of the Union natural strategy is well beyond the boundaries that were then established. And in its eastern dimension, the neighborhood policy sought to prevent the emergence of new dividing lines and to offer the extension of the benefits of economic and political integration also to the neighbors further beyond the immediate boundaries of the European Union in view of the subsequent debates. I think it should be remembered that at the time this offer was an offer also to Russia. But as Russia had its own partnership and cooperation agreement with the European Union since 1995, as is Russia wanted a far more privileged relationship, it declined to be part of the European neighborhood policy. In its southern dimension, that policy sought to develop instruments to facilitate reforms, developments, and integration throughout the entire vast region of North Africa and the Middle East. I think many of us remember the landmark report by the UN Human Development Report in 2003 that shed new light on how all of these countries were falling behind the rest of the world in virtually every important respect of development. The absence of reform throughout that region could clearly spell the risk of revolution. Stability could very easily give way to instability. In the words of the already mentioned security strategy, the aim of the European neighborhood policy where it was initiated in 2003 was, quote, to promote a wing of well-governed countries to the east of the European Union and on the borders of the Mediterranean with whom we can enjoy close and cooperative relationships. Or, in the words of the then president of the European Commission, Romani Prodi seek to help to create a wing of friends around the European Union. But as we look at the situation now, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that we are surrounded less by a wing of friends but rather by a wing of fire. In the east, we have the rise of a revisionist and reactionary Russia challenging not only the very basis of the security of our continent but increasingly also portraying itself as an opponent to our open, liberal, and secular societies. And in the south, the multitude of economic, political, and sectarian challenges that increasingly question the order across large part of their world, of which the collapse of Libya, the continued destruction of Syria, the rise of Daesh, the expansion of al-Qaeda-affiliated groups, and also the turmoil in Yemen are just some of the very many manifestations of the words from 2003 no longer rings true. Europe has gone from a feeling of security unrivaled in its modern history only a little more than a decade ago to increasingly feeling itself under strain, siege, or even threat. And it's accordingly struggling to deal with these new realities, to learn the lessons, understand the challenges, and shot the road ahead. Indeed, to starting with the formalities, the European neighborhood policy is now up for review this year, and the high representative has been tasked with presenting a strategic review of our place in this more connected, contested, and more complex world. And let me just make some remarks on the lessons of the past and the challenges ahead. First, fairly obviously, in the East. In the debate in Europe and also here in the States, one sometimes here the question of whether we've made any mistakes in our policy in this direction during the last few years. Did we do enough to accommodate the fears or the interests of Russia? In my opinion, it is rather the other way around. The mistake that we might have done or made was to let the crisis of the war between Russia and Georgia in 2008 pass much too quickly. Here, Russia clearly demonstrated that its threshold for using military force against neighbors was far lower than most of us had thought. And it also started to elaborate the doctrine of a right to intervene militarily in other countries if it considered that the interests of Russian citizens were not sufficiently protected. But by very soon going back to business as normal in our relations to which was added, we set coming from Washington and the Obama administration. We might inadvertently have set the signal that we were ready to tolerate a Russian behavior along these lines. It should be remembered that this was appeared when we were seeking to deepen in different ways our engagements with Russia. We had initiated the Eastern Partnership with the six countries of Eastern Europe and Southern Caucasus in 2008 and 2009. And in late 2009 and formally in 2010, we started to elaborate what we call a partnership for modernization with Russia. That if you read what it said was hardly less ambitious in its approach than the most ambitious parts of the Eastern Partnership. This was, should be added of course, the period of President Medvedev if he is still remembered. But then of course things started to change. Prior to coming back for his third time as president of Russia, Vladimir Putin has started to elaborate his concept of what we call the Eurasian Union. At soon it became apparent that this was his great design for the region in the years to come. The negotiations with the European Union on a so-called new agreement, the factor came to hold as Moscow, suddenly without any consultation, announced a customs union that ran completely contrary to the concept of free trade between Lisbon and Vladivostok that until then had been the somewhat distant but still declared aim of what we were trying to do together. In the meantime, Ukraine had in 2011 concluded its negotiations with the European Union on an association agreement and what came to be called deep and comprehensive free trade. Two things should be noted in this respect. The first is that at no time did Russia bring up any objections or concern over this during the summits that were held twice a year between EU and Russia. EU has a higher frequency of summits with Russia than with any other country or any other entity in the world. At no time did Russia bring up this subject during these years. The second thing to be noted is of course that this agreement with Ukraine was of course perfectly compatible with existing free trade agreement between Russia and Ukraine and in no way negatively affected the interests of Russia. You can make the comparison with Mexico being both the part of the NAFTA zone and having a free trade agreement with the European Union. I have not heard anyone ever in the United States claim that the later agreement with the EU hurts the interests of the United States. On the contrary, the more prosperous Mexico is in the economic as well as the security interests of the United States and exactly the same goes for the effects of a free trade agreement between the European Union and Ukraine. But they had other thoughts and from the summer of 2013 the Kremlin initiated a brutal trade, economic and political offence against Ukraine. Against Ukraine concluding its agreement with the EU and it was very clear that the ultimate aim was to have Ukraine enter into the Kremlin centric Eurasian Union that was then beginning to take form. The rest, as they say, is history. The Kremlin escalated its economic pressures. It initiated a vigorous political campaign against the course that Ukraine had decided upon and it then also resorted to first military aggression to take Crimea and then destabilization and renewed military aggression in eastern Ukraine. A year ago the aim was clearly to not only incorporate Crimea into Russia that had already been done at that time but to establish the so-called Novorossiya statelet along the entire Black Sea coast to and including Odessa with the rest of Ukraine then being reduced to some sort of greater Galicia. Indeed, you can see the clear hints of this in the triumphant March 18 speech of President Putin. But the policy, as a matter of fact, failed. Ukraine, weak as it was, conducted democratic presidential elections, mobilized resistance, and in August of last year the entire Russian endeavor was close to collapse and regular Russian battalion battle groups had to be ordered into Ukraine to save the entire separate adventure for complete collapse. Since then we've had something like a fragile stalemate codified in the Minsk agreements in the Minsk agreements in the two separate incarnations. The sanctions much discussed that were decided against Russia after the first occupation of Crimea and then following also the shooting down of the MH17s are in comparison with other sanctions regime in the world relatively mild. But with the combination of the structural problems that the abandonment of the reform road was starting to expose and the decline in oil prices there's little doubt that the Russian economy has entered a more difficult period. Yegogradar was in my opinion one of the most brilliant minds that Russia has produced in modern times. And in his majestic book, Russia Along with You that he wrote in 2008 a year before he tragically died he wrote about the problems ahead and I quote It is not hard to be popular and have political support when you have 10 years of growth of real income at 10% a year. When the real income influenced by vacillations in world markets stops growing unemployment increases and the situation in the depressed regions grows volatile the regime has alternative strategies the first is to increase repression against opposition that is the tempting but suicidal strategy end of the quote those were his words of warning in 2008 and the structural weaknesses of the Russian economy are indeed very real if we look at them during the next 15 years or so its labour force will decline by a million people every year life expectancy for men is still at levels more associated with Africa than with Europe and Russia's share of international patents is 0.2% which I understand is roughly the same as the state of Alabama with due respect to them but for all of the problems that this undoubtedly entails I think it would be unwise to expect these in themselves to force the Kremlin to change the policy course that it has embarked upon and even if there is a weaker Russia this might not help much if there is an even weaker Ukraine power we should remember is a relative concept it is certainly important that sanctions are kept in place as long as the conditions that cause us to decide upon them haven't changed this is a matter of credibility also in view, I would say primarily in view of what might happen in the years to come we must not repeat the mistake of 2008 but even and far more important is what we do to strengthen Ukraine it will be the will and the ability of the nation of Ukraine at the end of the day will decide the outcome the actions of President Putin has changed the nation of Ukraine for generations to come I say with Mr. Valtasar here that it sometimes said that the nation of Finland really came together after the civil war that its independence in 1917 was associated with that it really came together in the trenches of the Karelianismus and attacked it in 1939 and the same might well be said in the future about Ukraine as a result of the aggressions of 2014 invading countries is not a good way of making friends but Ukraine needs our support and our help to succeed its economic reforms require the support of the package of the IMF as well as the other measures that are undertaken by the European Union by its member states by the United States by Japan by numerous other countries that are willing to help the country will go through a valley of tears as these are implemented but with strong political leadership and support from friendly countries there is no reason to believe that they will not succeed and full implementation of the agreement with the EU on deep and comprehensive free trade is also of critical importance independent studies suggest that the simple implementation of the agreement would bring benefits of roughly an additional 6% of GDP over the medium term and roughly 12% in terms of increased welfare for the Ukrainian people and much more can be expected if Ukraine genuinely implement the reforms foreseen by the agreement as they would improve the business climate and help to attract foreign investments and technology transfers but in creating space but in creating space for the economic reforms and political talks it is also important to help Ukraine in blocking the military option for Russia whether this is done through more direct assistance with training and weapons to their defence forces or whether the deployment of some sort of international peacekeeping or monitoring force along the so called touch line is a better option must be discussed very carefully but to do neither is to risk sending the signal that the military option is a relatively easy one for the Kremlin and that will of course undercut our efforts to seek a political solution if we look at the situation as it might developed over the next few years I believe we can see two broad alternatives the first one is that there is a stabilisation in strengthening of Ukraine facilitated also by the deep economic reforms and that the conflict in its eastern modes parts that is initially frozen is over time given some sort of political solution the holding of local elections according to the standards of the OSCE and hopefully with significant international participation could pave the way for some sort of interim special status for the region if that is what is desired the question of Crimea will certainly remain on the table it can probably only be addressed in a longer time perspective but this scenario should facilitate more open relations with Russia between Russia and the west and should also in my opinion highly likely inspire reforms and changes in Russia itself the second possibility is that Ukraine falls fails and perhaps fractures and descends into a zone of continuous confrontation and conflict for years to come and this would be profoundly dangerous not only do I fear that it will drive a further militarization of the politics of Russia but also that the likely war mood of its regime could then drive it into adventures also in other areas perhaps leading to direct confrontation or even a war with NATO thus it is imperative that we invest as heavily as we can in the first options its success or failure will decide not only the immediate future and fate of Ukraine its success or failure will decide the fate of peace in Europe as a whole for years to come in a couple of weeks the countries of the European Union will meet with the countries of the eastern partnership at a summit meeting in Riga it is very important that we are then clear that we stand by all of our commitments to them and that we are now prepared to give primarily Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia the help they need in implementing the very ambitious agreements with the EU the question of membership for them in the European Union is certainly not on the table now we should be honest and saying that the road ahead is a long run but we should also be clear that article 49 of the Treaty of Rome has an open door for every nation of Europe there are no exceptions that I am aware of in that treaty text and the lighthouse guiding reforms and transformation that this does represent however distant must not be shut down as we shot the road ahead it is of course necessary to have as clear pictures possible of where Russia might be heading far from easy President Putin has made Russia an unpredictable country that is a danger in itself that we are dealing with a revisionist Russia is now accepted by almost everyone it no longer accepts the principles of the post-Cold War order in Europe but we are also dealing with a reactionary Russia in the same way as its revisionism seeks inspiration from its history we see a Russia reverting to a modern version of the reactionary guardian role of Alexander I as he sought to fight the forces of modernization and popular will in the decades after the Napoleonic wars today's Russia sees itself as a bulwark against western societies that it describes as too secular too tolerant and open also to other cultures and ideas we see it trying to paint a picture of a muscular east versus a decadent west we've got the guns and you've got the gaze we see it trying to play on nationalism across Europe a revisionist and a reactionary Russia a critical question is of course whether it also a reckless Russia confronted with perhaps but probably not I rather see a regime in the Kremlin that seeks to divide that looks for weakness and that certainly can be ruthless in exploiting opportunities when it sees them the days and the weeks after the collapse of the Anukovych regime in Ukraine was clearly an opportunity and it was ruthlessly exploited that there was a certain disarray and confusion in the west was also part of that picture but if we manage to preserve the unity of the west the unity of the European Union and the unity of the Atlantic and if the elected representatives and leaders of Ukraine manage to preserve the fundamental unity of their country such opportunities should simply not be there I'm saying that but adding two important caveats first the risk that Kremlin will miscalculate it already did so a number of times during this crisis it might well happen again and then it might be far more dangerous and second that we must understand that this is an issue that will play out over a prolonged period of time a new US president will be elected in 2016 there will be key European elections France and Germany in 2017 President Putin might well have himself re-elected in 2018 for a new period stretching to 2024 when there might well be yet another US president in the White House on the issue of Ukraine it will not be enough just with strategic patience what will be required is strategic determination over a prolonged period of time this is the key to the security of Ukraine and the stability of Europe but also to the eventual emergence of Russia that can be a true partner for modernization and for cooperation and for integration from Lisbon to Vladivostok few things are more important if we turn our attention to our southern neighborhood the challenges are hardly easier the thousands and thousands risking and losing their lives crossing the Mediterranean is just one of the of the challenges we face it's crisis after crisis Libya or Syria or Yemen or Iraq Gaza heading towards its next explosion the belt of terrorist organizations that we see from al-Qaeda in Maghreb over Bukharam and al-Shabaab al-Qaeda, Arabian Peninsula Daesh and related organizations all of them in the vicinity of Europe the issues that we see there are both separate and related and if you look at the broader picture I fear that we might well be facing the Arabs words equivalent of what happened in Europe nearly half a millennium ago in the 30 years war it was then in Europe a period of religious turmoil and profound sectarian strife it was a period of economic hardship social turmoil and violent rebellions it was a period of power politics and proxy wars it was a period of failing rulers and faltering states and the very complexity of this pattern of interwar and conflicts made it exceedingly difficult for Europe to find a settlement and secure some sort of stability just look at the structural issues that we find throughout the Arab region today in very many cases regimes that lack true and genuine legitimacy and in most cases regimes that can't deliver the social and economic development that is necessary a feeling of injustice and humiliation that causes very many young people to fall for the lure of fundamentalist calls a region of nearly 400 million people that have non-oil exports no larger than those of Belgium unemployment rates are the highest of any region in the world also in the best of countries no more than a quarter of the women are employed every year 650,000 persons enter the labour force of Egypt and with its population growing fast each one river through a desert within a few decades have more people than Russia spanning 11 time zones the regions approximately 400 million people will by 2050 be nearly 50% more IMF is saying that in order to keep an employment where it is not reducing it the region needs to grow more than 7% that's more than double the rate that it had during previous periods as things stands today clearly the chance of that happening is very slim indeed as we try to shape our policies we must focus not only the short term obvious challenges of the day with diplomacy region but also these long term structural challenges and that is natural from the European point of view we must use all the means we have to advocate more open governments and more open economies we must do whatever we can to promote trade entrepreneurship and economic development in order to prevent rising despair from leading to even more turmoil and even stronger totalitarian temptations and this must of course go hand in hand with an active policy of conflict prevention and conflict resolution my hope is to take one example is that the US would be ready to join other countries in having the UN Security Council lay down the clear parameters for just and viable and secure two state solution for Israel and Palestine my urge would be that the EU uses the opening with Iran that the nuclear agreement will give to promote an active diplomacy in order to seek a responsible Iranian behaviour to homes and my conviction is that our concern for the stability of the day must not block our urge to respect the human rights that long term are essential preconditions for the stability that we are seeking taking together there is little doubt that you are presented a more challenging period in terms of its security we hear the thunder of the guns around Donetsk we hear and see the cries for help in the Mediterranean and these things are bringing home a new reality also to the ordinary European hard power is back in business geopolitics is challenging globalization the cohesion of Europe and the West is under threat it's only by working together in Europe as well as across Atlantic with other partners sharing our interests and values that we can handle the new challenges of this distinctly more dangerous and demanding time thanks you all can see well I hope you all can see now why I think it's Karl Bilt's one of the most interesting intellects that I've ever met a man who you must have fairly restricted number of people you see because he has the capacity to integrate practical real problems into a theoretical framework and it's been a very rich marvelous presentation Karl I've got to pose a few questions and I'm going to turn to all of you let me you talked really about the two crises the crisis to the south let me begin by asking isn't there a third crisis and that's the sense of confidence in Europe that it can handle all of these problems you know at its core this complex relationship with Russia you said both a reactionary and a revisionist power very interesting formulation but at its core President Putin is trying to revalidate the authoritarian mobilization model you know where a central government decides and dictates conditions to citizens uses the coercive instruments of the state to compel their loyalty compared against the European ideal of representative governments reflecting the will of society and governments that are accountable through elections their problems are modulated through a political process it's peaceful I mean it seems to me we have those two worldviews really in competition again and yet we have Europe deeply divided internally we have America deeply divided politically internally and we've got energy and enthusiasm for this authoritarian mobilization model is this a crisis well it's clearly a challenge I mean no question as I indicated when you elaborate Russia is trying to sort of present a model of muscular nationalist the strong man we've seen strong men before but clearly the strong man if you see the pictures that they distribute of President Putin is together with tigers or motorbike gangs or things like that it's pictures of the sort that no political leader in Europe or the US would voluntarily have distributed they keep their shirts on it's the muscular nationalism it's a strong man and is this something that is going to fly long term I don't think it will but there is an audience for it in Russia there's no question about that there's an audience for it in certain European countries I think sometimes on the extreme left because the extreme left is against the Americans there's always an audience for that and they're applying on the extreme right because they're always in favor of the strong man and militant nationalism can we handle it we of course discuss quite a lot the divisions that we have and we do have them and as you said Europe has gone through a fairly difficult period we had five years of dealing just with the eurozone crisis it was the one crisis meeting after the other in fact it's always in a crisis because it's always work in progress there's always things that we haven't done that we are seeking to do but if we talk about our fundamental strength it is of course significant the Russian economy is difficult to know the currency is fluctuating significantly smaller than Italy but probably slightly larger than the Netherlands and I indicated the structural problems the European economy does have its problems but it's still the largest integrated economy in the world has a significant surplus on its trade with the rest of the world and it's I think still the largest sort of FDI and the largest receptions of FDI in the world so that's why I'm saying if we just manage our unity and get together then I think their attempt to overplay their strength will not work as the Russian assertion as President Putin's assertion of sort of spheres of influence and rights of influence the right to move in to defend Russian citizens in other countries has that caused Europe fundamentally to come together again to revalidate the principles of the European Union or is the division still strong where is it? well I mean start with another organization that you might have heard of called NATO there's no question that Putin had done wonders to NATO after a period when NATO was out there far away difficult missions necessary and honorable and all of that but far away and there's a new vigor in the organization no question about it people see the necessity of it it's primarily the north and the east so there you clearly see that NATO is back with this coalition the European Union is still struggling with economic issues Greece is still an issue needless to say primarily for the Greeks and then if there is a problem it takes some time this is an organization of 28 countries 500 million people a rather complex structure of governance for it to for new reality to truly sink in and result in new policy it doesn't happen overnight and if there is one thing that is likely worrying at the moment although I wouldn't overdo it is that you have an element of debate by people saying well it's the crisis in the east that we should focus on and then we have some people in the south saying no it's not the east it's the south it's what's happening in the Mediterranean and you have a battle of priorities and we must come to terms with the fact that we must deal with both of them and learn to handle not only one significant crisis but several significant crises I mean that's whether we can learn from the United States I'm not quite certain but it might be somewhere else we can learn I thought your formulation and a lot of the problem began with how we responded to Georgia and you know we it was an assertion again of this first time a very muscular assertion of a spheres of influence approach to foreign policy after Georgia happened Foreign Minister Lavrov went around to many of the capitals in Europe basic with the same message what did he say and it was usually the same we don't like what happened to us when NATO expanded east in our direction we still don't like that we're not going to fight that but we're not going to let it go any further now let me turn around and ask what he's recently been articulating this strategy of defending Russians where they are oppressed what is the risk of a Russian Anschluss in a place like Latvia it would shatter NATO potentially depending on how we respond is that a high risk in your mind you think that's a low risk I think at the moment it's a low risk I think I wouldn't call it bogged down but it's the Ukraine that is the name of the game but as I said if we were to fail in Ukraine and he were to succeed however you define that then appetite grows with eating and then I think we might enter slightly more dangerous periods because then you might see the even more revisionist even more nationalist even more authoritarian forces in Russian politics coming to the forefront and there are those whose agenda is there are those who's immediate agenda they're quite explicit about the borders of the Russian Empire as it once was I don't think those are the ones that are steering the policy as we speak I have to say but I think we should be aware of the fact that how we handle the crisis now might well significantly influence whether these they will have any power further down the line as for Russians in and then roughly million Russians in in Estonia and Latvia I would argue that those have better human rights protections than every Russian in the Russian Federation I mean they can't be thrown to Yale for their political views and they have significantly better economic and social conditions and no one has ever come to the idea of denying the right to speak their language it doesn't have enough Russian but I mean they are they are part of the European Union and if there are any human rights issues I mean they have sort of they can appeal to the European Court of Human Rights which is the most sort of elaborate and intrusive mechanism for protecting human rights anywhere in the world I'm not aware of there being any cases as a matter of fact but in theory they could so they are sort of I would argue more protected than the Russians in Russia Prime Minister let me ask you mentioned that there are two paths forward with Ukraine one is where we suck it up start helping them get the economy moving actively you know interject ourselves to this the other is to let it spin out of control it becomes chaos we've got probably decades of a mess my impression is that nobody wants to pay to fix Ukraine that you know Europeans don't really want to pay we don't want to pay Russians don't want to pay I mean who's willing to really pay to fix a country that has lost so much credibility over these last 20 years as being a responsible state no I'm you're correct I mean the amount of money is clearly involved but the amount of money that is involved in helping the Ukrainians is sort of a fraction of what European countries have invested in Greece and not that Greece had a stellar track record for managing its affairs prior to that to put it in those terms but it was seen as sort of a necessary investment in the stability of the continent in order to try to help the Greek government overcome as long as there was a Greek government that was interested to overcome its problems that's a separate issue and everything is I said dependent upon there being the will and the ability of the Ukrainians themselves if they don't do it we can't do it but if they are really continuing the course that we see now it is a fairly limited investment in the stability of the European continent taking into consideration the amount of money that has been sunk in far away places of which we have known even less let me shift and I will turn to all of you just I want one last question and I'll come to you if I may in your speech and I was fortunate enough to get a copy in advance you were talking about the crisis to the south and you talk about the lack of true and genuine legitimacy in many countries and a feeling of injustice and humiliation that causes many young people to call for the lure of fundamentalists I think we have been a bit off balance since the Arab spring erupted on the stage it caught us at a point where we had to tension between our interests and our values we are interested in stability in peacetime you should be promoting your values but when crisis comes you focus on your interests it seems to me we have a non-stop problem this way what would be your advice in this everything is upside down right now in the Persian Gulf it's stabilized in Egypt but it's a bit the old pattern what would you say we should do is there a grand architecture for this I'm not certain there's a grand architecture but I argue in focusing on and not forgetting the long term structural issues because if they are not sorted out nothing else will work at the same time recognizing that this is not done overnight this is something that it's a question of decades in order to fix the region if that sort of superficial expression can be used but as we are involved in short term conflict management, conflict resolution conflict prevention which by necessity we are and should be sometimes I think we have forgotten the long term structural issues and it's them that I think drives the short term problems I mean that sentence that we voted about young people when we see sort of the pictures of the awful things that Daesh is doing we tend to say that no one can be attracted by this that is not the case it is a very attractive force in the region among young people because it is seen as justice and revenge true values in a way that is a rebellion against what they perceive as regimes with limited legitimacy sometimes imposed by the outside world sometimes some other things unable to deliver the economic and social development and then these sort of what I call totalitarian temptations are very strong and that you can deal short term with a couple of air campaigns perhaps but long term you can't you need to deal with more fundamental issues there is a fellow standing up and then we'll thank you my name is Andrey Sitov I'm with us the Russian news agency here in Washington DC glad I called on you excuse me glad I called on you first thank you sir and I'm afraid my question is not on geopolitics but it's very important to me and I think you will see why I had a friend in my company his name was Vladimir Yitsin he was a photojournalist 15 years ago he was abducted and killed in Chechnya by terrorists some other hostages were rescued so the perpetrators unknown one of the perpetrators fled to Sweden was detained there on Russian requests was released there later my colleague in Stockholm said that you were in office at that time and that she actually once brought the issue to your attention and received an encouraging response but she never could follow up with you on this so you I hope you understand why this issue stays with me I still want justice done and yes and my question is very simple do you think that this justice can still be done thank you you can choose to answer or not it's a narrow question I hope I'm right in knowing the details of the case we've had a couple of them two I think I'm looking at the ambassador to be and Russia has then requested of these persons to say they are probably guilty of something which I shouldn't well I'm not in office I can now say highly likely that is the case what is our system is that then that goes to the Supreme Court and that decides if we can extradite and in this particular case they said if I remember it rightly yes but they said and the but was because we can only extradite reasonable confidence in the legal system of the country that they would be given sort of some fair process and in this particular case the judgment was done that they cannot be given a fair trial in Grosny because we don't have really confidence in the legal system of the Shetri Republic or whatever it's called rightly or wrongly I think rightly but we said if the Russian government can assures that they can do a trial in Moscow then we'll extradite the Russian government didn't do that the Russian government said that that was interference in the legal affairs of the Russian Federation and the trial should be held in Grosny and that was the standstill and I think it was that's our legal situation and we were willing to help but Russia was not willing to take that particular step lady right here at this table thank you hi I'm Dr. Donna Wells I'm a mathematician I make predictive math models right now I have some data that suggests that France specifically has been targeted in terms of violence international violence in the last year and I'm wondering if that's something that you've noticed and do you think that's by design thank you I mean it's very difficult to quantify which countries have been the most hit by violence clearly you have the Charlie Hebdo web tech and there have been a number of others if you take it in a slightly longer perspective of course there is still or there's some time ago the different legacies of the Algerian war that has its impact upon France that has led perhaps to somewhat of a more difficult situation in France but otherwise we should be aware of the fact that sort of the things I wouldn't say that we have terrorism all over the place in Europe all the time but we've had it in several different countries and I don't think that we can sort of rest in the conviction that any European country is isolated from this we had one person in 2010 who was trying to blow himself up in my opinion in the middle of a subway station in the middle of Stockholm on a very sort of night when there were lots of people he was not particularly competent on it so he blew himself up 200 meters from there and that was less good for him but extremely good for everyone else and roughly at the same time our security service apprehended a group of mixed but also Swedes who were on their way to attack the newspaper offices in Copenhagen from Sweden which over to Copenhagen roughly the same as the Charlie Hebdo attacked and out to be so this is part of the new reality that Europe is living on right over here sir thank you very much you're only a former member of the Swedish Parliament and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Carl Bilt I'd like to ask you in regards, Russia has never dealt with history it's totalitarian past the same goes for a lot of the northern countries the totalitarian past have not been dealt with even in Russia they are closing down the Gulag museum in Perm revising history and what not what influence does this negligence of history have in today's situation I think it is very true they've done it partially but they've not done it fully I think it has a negative impact on the domestic development of Russia obviously but it has an even more negative development on its possibility of building true bridges of friendship with the neighbors Germany to put it mildly had a rather difficult 20th century but Germany went through a period of dealing with its history and that was important in order to get stability to German democracy but also made it possible to have a reconciliation with France and even more difficult with Poland and a small country like Luxembourg which they had mild treated massively so without that sorting out the history recognizing what happened reconciliation with the neighbors becomes very difficult and that's still the case I mean in the Ukraine case you can discuss these things historians should decide the details of the issues what happened during the 1930s some you hold it or more some consider that a genocide some not but I mean that has to be sorted out it's an open wound Catherine oh it has to be said I have to say something nice about President Putin as a matter of fact they did move forward that was a good thing there should be some pluses here on the occupation of the Baltic state it's been back and forth back and forth and now I think it's back again and they are Putin had a statement the other day or the other week where he said that the August 23rd 1939 packed with Hitler might have been a rather good idea at the time I mean not really the things that inspire confidence in the neighbors Daria right behind you Jennifer thank you very much Jennifer McPee you very eloquently painted the picture of the threat from the east but I'm just wondering if you could speak vis-a-vis your own country Sweden and Finland not members of NATO but apparently there's more and more discussion about the possibility could you comment on that please on the threat from Finland no that's always with us no no no but I think Sweden and Finland Denmark you mean NATO membership and the threat from the east being Russia no there is a more vigorous discussion about that both in Finland and Sweden and opinion poll figures have been moving quite significant more I think they've been moving more in Sweden than they have in Finland as a matter of fact and significant steps have been taken both in terms of increasing cooperation between Sweden and Finland on defence matters within the Nordic countries and when we say within the Nordic countries it is by definition with NATO it is Norway and Denmark are members of NATO if we cooperate with Denmark and Norway we do cooperate with NATO and a lot of that is done and there is a substantial scope for going further which I think would be exploited in the years ahead as for formal membership well let's see I mean Sweden decided in the late 1940s not to become a member of NATO in the debate at the time but in essence there was one reason why we didn't enter NATO and that was called Finland out of consideration to the far more sensitive position that Finland had in those days that Sweden stayed outside there were other reasons as well but this was a dominant one things are different but Sweden would not move on this issue without Finland and probably the same would apply if we see it from the Finnish perspective and we will see the government that we have in Sweden today is sort of less enthusiastic even about discussing the idea but there is some opening about studying sort of long term security cooperation ideas there is a process underway in Finland as we speak to form a new government and I would guess Finland will declare that it has an open possibility to apply for membership of NATO but I don't think it's imminent but they have a slightly more open door policy than Sweden at the moment but I don't think it's likely that it's going to happen in the meantime we will fully utilize the scope for increased cooperation in different respects I've got a lot of questions I'm surprised nobody has asked it yet let me just ask the big debate going on over here is whether or not we should provide lethal assistance to Ukraine what do you think well as I hinted in my speech I think we must do something in order to help to bring the signal to Putin that there is not a military option for him and you can strengthen that defence capability we've been training which is on go non-lethal equipment which is on go and there could also be some lethal equipment the other alternative could be complementary is I think to deploy some sort of peacekeeping force or the international monetary force along what is called the touchline the Russians will not like that they have explicitly said that they think that is contrary to the Minsk agreement probably she's not and the fact that they don't like the idea of a peacekeeping force is I think a very strong argument why it might be or the good idea to have it because and I said you could do either of these two you could do a mixture of them but to do neither I think is dangerous Thank you Mary Louise Kelly now with the Atlantic you mentioned Greece and I'd love to press you on that because that's a challenge of Europe's own making how confident are you that the Euro will survive this ongoing series of crises and specifically how confident are you that a year from now or five years from now Greece will still be a member of the currency well I'm asked that the Euro will survive how confident am I in that no question about that I'm also fairly certain that there's sort of even this Greek government which I wouldn't vote for even under a torture will do its utmost to remain in the Euro whether they will succeed is another question the background I sort of take some issue with how you phrased it this is a crisis of Europe's making this is I mean the Greek economy has not been messed up by the Danes or the Finns or the Swedes it's been messed up by the Greeks I mean it's a successive Greek governments that have fundamentally mismanaged the Greek economy within the Eurozone you have countries that have managed their economies very well and you have this spectacular example of mismanagement the fact that you're in a currency union or have a certain currency doesn't guarantee that everything works smoothly you can still mess up things and they did and then they must get themselves out of it and they have been given massive European help in order to prevent a collapse as a result of their own mistakes the problem is this government doesn't want to sort out the problems they want to continue down a populist course that is fairly similar to the one that brought them into the problems and what this will entail remains to be seen I'm on press and trends I think we're heading for a very problematic next few years for Greece in social and economic terms what impact that will have on Europe not necessarily that big but it's a country that we all have sort of feelings for and hope that it would do better but I mean we've seen other examples without too many comparisons too hard Venezuela has messed things up Argentina has given the one example of the other how you can destroy an economy populist policies can destroy economies and Greece is showing that on the continent of Europe in the same way as we've seen it in other parts of the world this lady down here has been very patient she's got the scarf on could you put it on the table my name is Johanna Mollerstrom before I emigrated to the US from Sweden I was an elected politician for the same party as you so I think you will not be surprised that I agree to a lot of your views but one thing I would love you to elaborate a little bit on is in what respect do you think that the internal crisis that at least I see in terms of the rising populism with various shades of racism in Europe and Sweden also to what extent do you think that is a consequence of the crisis the multiple crisis that you are talking about and to what extent do you think that this populism has consequences for how Europe can act in resolving or handling the current situation it depends it's very different in different countries we have as you say we have the rise of there are very different in different countries I mean to say that the uniform way is I think to exaggerate it if you look at the front national in France it's a very French phenomena you have nothing of the sort in Germany you have a small party that is the alternative for Deutschland but has really nothing to do with front national and even if you take these populist parties in the Scandinavian countries they are sort of different to their origin what might be the thing that unites them to some extent immigration but in more general terms there is a section of the electorate in all of our countries that believes that things have gone too fast society is changing too fast globalization has brought in not only immigrants but rapid economic change and rapid social change and they are the ones that sort of could conceivably listen to sort of the temptations of the sort of muscular nationalist orthodox muscular nationalist that Putin represents racism yes but primarily not that I would say sort of that feeling that stop the word I want to get off things were better before that's the sentiment that is there and that is the task then of the so called established political parties to handle that every democratic system now and then is subject to the rise of a new force of different sorts that's the way democracy works and then democracy is supposed to take care of that in the way that you sort of try to convince those particular ones or try to get them back into some sort of reasonable fold and we'll see Finland is going to be interesting again to see they have this party which is I think we do we call them fins or true fins in English we call them true fins I think so true fins they are fins but not very, anyhow they are called true fins whether they decide to take them into government or not which I think is highly likely if they do that then it's a question of trying to then to integrate them into the political system in order to handle that political sentiment that is there in part of society I'm sorry we've got so many questions we don't have time right here in this table Dari and then this will be the last question Hello, Tom O'Donnell I actually I've lived in Berlin the last few years I'm here with the American Institute of Contemporary German Studies for a while I've got a question about Germany as an American going to Europe I was a little bit surprised you know this is the era the wall came down everybody celebrates this is sort of the official ideology of this is but when you look at the nitty gritty I'd like to ask your opinion of a couple things on the one hand there's this aspect of Germany taking a leading role recently and the question then is are they prepared to take this role and I see when I hear their diplomats and officials talk about the difficulties of the making decisions Steinmeier I think every speech he gives he starts on Ukraine by saying of course anything besides a diplomatic solution is unthinkable which I even if you think that I wouldn't want to tell Mr. Putin every day so there's the elite but I must say also I'm surprised I need to focus on your question if you can comment on that amongst the people there's also quite a bit of disillusionment with the western after all after Iraq and so forth what's Putin doing different but if you could just speak to this issue the leadership speak to German leadership on this yeah Germany has got itself in the leadership position very much on primarily the Ukrainian issue and there are a number of reasons for that one of them is that when I said that there are policies of course trying to divide Europe trying to get understanding no country is more important for him from that point of view than Germany I mean and not only does he has his own political history personal history in Germany and speaks the language and all of that but there's also a history of sort of German, Russian understanding and trying to get things moving together so and of course then we have the Schroeder and this phrase in the German debate the first year the segment of German opinion that was said to be rather understanding of Russia some of them for reasons that I can understand in the sense there was a deep German feeling of gratitude to Russia for reunification the peaceful reunification of that country would simply not have been possible without Russia agreeing to it and a lot of them still feel that they have their over gratitude to Russia so he's been playing on on Germany but he's encountered Chancellor Merkel who is quite a tough lady and if Putin has his history with Germany she has her history with policies originating from Russia she speaks German, she speaks Russian and that has led to sort of them being very much in focus and I think she has handled it extremely well she's been sort of the guardian of the European interests in the dialogue in the harshest of the dialogues with Putin so there was a reason that they were really playing on Germany to a large extent there was a reason why sort of Germany stood up to it and has also been very keen Germany has just made a review of his foreign policy and sort of big debates and published documents and things and Germany is extremely keen to say that what we do within the European context is as representative of the rest of the Europeans so it is German leadership but within a very clear European context and so far I think even if I would in principle say this should have been done by the institutions in Brussels but so far I can't complain about the practical results of it on the contrary Ladies and gentlemen I think you've seen why Carl Bilt has seen as being one of the leading foreign policy intellects and leaders in Europe I think we're very grateful you spoke to us you reasoned with us you helped us understand with your applause please say thank you this is really fun