Only a year ago there were debates in the Ukrainian society as to whether Ukraine and Russia were moving closer to Europe «in different ways» or whether «Ukraine’s road to Brussels goes through Moscow» (1).

The question of whether one can regard Ukraine’s integration into the European Union out of the context of the development of Russia’s relationships with the European Union has now been exhausted, because Russia has finally defined its position. In the Medium-term Strategy for Development of Relations between the Russian Federation and the European Union (2000 — 2010) (2), which was the Russian Government’s response, made public in October 1999, to the Common Strategy of the European Union of 4 June 1999 on Russia (3), the Government of the Russian Federation (RF) said plump that Russia not only did not want to accede to the European Union, but even did not strive to become its associated member (4).

In the medium-term perspective, The Strategy of Russia emphasized the desire to build relations with the European Union on the basis of agreements. In this respect, the Agreement on the Partnership and Cooperation (APC) between the European Community and the Russian Federation, signed in 1994, remains its legal framework, but the Russian government wants to sign a «new framework agreement on strategic partnership and cooperation in the 21st cenruty», which should supplant the APC.

Russia wants to be a partner rather than a member of the European Union. It (or, to be more exact, the current Russian leadership) is not (and, supposedly, all previous governments were not) ready to delegate its national sovereignty to a supranational body, which is a conditio sine qua non of the European Union membership. Russia wishes to «reserve for itself the right to independent definition of its domestic and foreign policies», as the Medium-term Strategy holds it.

Russia regards itself as a superpower, and all its internal and foreign policies are spearheaded toward the recovery of this status. Situated on two continents and having a sizeable population and abundant natural resources, Russia claims the role of an autonomous and original «pole» in a multipolar world.

However, Russia does not want to be excluded from Europe. Therefore, the objective of the Medium-term Strategy, worded rather explicitly, is «to consolidate Russia’s role and to safeguard its national interests in Europe.» Russia needs the European Union not only for its modernization. This accounts for another objective of Russia’s medium-term European strategy: «to mobilize the potential of the European Union for the sake of Russia’s development.» To put it bluntly, instead of becoming part of the European Union Russia wants to maintain relations with it.

In the future, Russia wants to regain its global capability. In order to secure Russian Federation’s national interests there is no need in integration in the supranational Union (5). At the same time, medium and small nations in Europe will be in a position to find their own places in the process of globalization only due to joint efforts; integration into the European Union is in line with their national interests.

Not only does not Russia want to, but it can not become a member of the European Union, even in a long-range perspective. The European Union recognizes Russia as a European country; moreover, Part 1 of the Common Strategy says that it is summoned «to assist Russia in gaining its European identity», but the European Union can not admit it as its member. Russia’s integration is impossible even because of its huge size. Given its vastness, Russia’s membership would undermine the construction, skillfully built by politicians, which can hold together both medium and small nations. Even if in the foreseeable future as a result of transformation process Russia should become compatible with the European Union both politically and economically, the latter simply will not be able to «incorporate» the Russian Federation as a country of huge dimensions.

The European Union, however, is in need of Russia. The European peninsula of the Asian continent needs the Asian dimension of the Russian Federation. The European Union is in need of an economic community with Russia, which would grant it access to Russia’s economic and intellectual potentials and natural resources in order to secure a firm position as an independent force in its relations with other extant and emergent large integrated economic entities. That is why «Russia’s integration in pan-European economic and social structures is one of the objectives of the Common Strategy of the EU on Russia. In addition, the European Union is in need of defense partnership with Russia in order to lessen its military dependence on the USA. The European Union in its Common Strategy goes beyond the boundaries of economic csooperation with Russia: it declares about its desire «to make a political dialog more intensive…, to put forward foreign policy initiatives and to maintain common foreign policy objectives.» The Common Strategy provides not only for «preventive diplomacy», it pursues the goal of cooperation with Russia for the purpose of creating a new architecture of security… and drafting a European Security Charter». It also contains arguments in favor of «studying possibilities of promoting Russia’s participation in West European Union missions, undertaken within the framework of the Petersburg tasks.»

The same interests are proclaimed by Russia in its European Strategy: Russia is seeking to create a free trade zone of the Russian Federation and the European Union and a system of collective security. i.e. economic and defense community with the European Union.