In their assessment of the state of the Eastern Partnership, as the Polish Presidency of the EU Council drew to a close at the end of 2011, two Russian policy specialists describe the initiative as an experimental EU project that, as demonstrated by other similar initiatives launched by the EU (Northern Dimension and the Barcelona Process), will most likely undergo serious institutional transmutation. For a variety of reasons, however, they found that none of the major actors was either willing or capable of making radical moves at this time.

The European Union is a security actor in Central Asia, although with less influence than other players. Russia and China have a much larger impact on Central Asian regimes’ security strategies. These limitations do not dispense with the need for the EU to provide a better security narrative, especially in light of its growing emphasis on human security, and to incorporate this into the current review of its strategy for the region. This policy brief will centre on the EU’s contribution to human security in Central Asia.

Algeria is so far the only country in North Africa not to have experienced sustained mass protests calling for political change. The government in Algiers has by no means remained indifferent to the groundbreaking events in neighbouring countries, but it is responding to this sweeping wave of change at its own pace. This paper argues that, despite its apparent stability, the Algerian polity suffers from underlying currents of instability that risk undermining the long-term sustainability of the state.

CEPS is a member of a consortium led by SOFRECO, and with CIDOB and ICMPD. Areas covered by this lot include European Neighbourhood Policy in the southern Mediterranean; EU bilateral and multilateral relations with the Mediterranean and Middle East; Barcelona Process.

The EU seems to move towards a regional focus in supporting civil society in Central Asia. This while the most urgent challenges of NGOs in the region are found in their national environment. Recent history and current developments explain why support for civil society initiatives on a national basis are needed more than ever in Central Asia.

Following the ‘revolution’ in April 2010, the subsequent interethnic violence in June and the recent international inquiry into these events, Kyrgyzstan is not in safe waters yet. The coming period leading up to the Presidential elections will be important for the country’s stability. What is the current situation in the South of the country, which saw clashes between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks, and what are the expectations for the presidential elections? Is Kyrgyzstan on the road to democracy, and what role can external actors play?

On 14 July European development ministers met in Sopot, Poland. Among a host of development related matters Central Asia was on the agenda and European Union Special Representative Pierre Morel and Development Commissioner Andris Piebalgs were invited to give political and development assistance oriented background to the European ministers. The Polish Presidency wants to devote special attention to EU development assistance to this often over-looked region, which the EU has traditionally viewed predominantly through a foreign policy lens.

The Kyrgyz town of Kara-Suu lies on the border with Uzbekistan, some 25 kilometres from Osh, the city most affected by the conflict between ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbeks on 10-17 June 2010. With a population of around 21,000, of which 67% are ethnic Uzbek, Kara-Suu also serves as the administrative centre of the Kara-Suu district, which includes the village of Nariman, with a predominantly Uzbek population and notorious as the scene of several high-profile and brutal murders, as well as suburbs of Osh.

In this first MEDPRO project Policy Paper, author Nathalie Tocci considers the concept of sustainability and how it is central to any understanding of Mediterranean politics. Too often confused with stability in policy debates in the Mediterranean region and the West, Tocci argues that not only are these two concepts distinct, with sustainability being broader and deeper than stability, but stability, as interpreted with regard to the regimes in the region, has often run counter to the very conditions that underpin state sustainability.

In this Commentary, CEPS Senior Research Fellow Michael Emerson finds that the huge political transition taking place in the Arab world approaches in importance that which erupted in Central and Eastern Europe two decades ago and comparable certainly in the power of cross-border revolutionary contagion. He offers a schema of regime types and conceivable regime dynamics that can be drawn up on the basis of what has already transpired in each of the countries affected, and what other regions of the world have experienced in their regimes’ transitions.

Any analysis of the prospects for stability and sustainability in the states of Syria and Lebanon reveals the strong ties between these two countries and the impact of external influences on their overall development. Their trajectories, while starkly divergent in terms of the challenges confronting them at present, ultimately converge on a path of long-term unsustainability.

In this Commentary, CEPS Senior Research Fellow Michael Emerson critiques the Review of the European Neighbourhood Policy recently published by the European Commission and the High Representative and arrives at the following main conclusions:
- The Arab spring has pushed the EU institutions into advocating a ‘more for more’ concept, confirming the view that the European Neighbourhood Policy has not been offering sufficient net benefits for its attempted conditionality to work.