EU encourages reform in Russia, with concern for social dimension

EU Foreign Ministers yesterday joined the chorus of international calls on Russia to press ahead with economic reform and pledged to send a ministerial delegation to Moscow as soon as a viable government is in place.

But the declaration from the informal meeting here went out of its way to temper the calls for a commitment to reform and budgetary and fiscal rigour with a warning that the social dimension of the crisis must not be ignored.

The fear is, as the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Andrews warned, of "the prospect of an appalling winter". That could plunge thousands of the most vulnerable into destitution, creating both a humanitarian disaster and social unrest that could threaten the reform process itself.

For the EU Presidency, the Austrian Foreign Minister, Mr Wolfgang Schussel, warned that Russia's GDP per capita was "now equivalent to or worse than that of Namibia". Pensioners were threatened with hyper inflation while workers faced massive wage arrears, he said.

The ministers welcomed the initiative by the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, in convening a meeting of high-level G7 officials on Saturday.

But a suggestion from the Italian Foreign Minister, Mr Lamberto Dini, that ministers recognise the likelihood of the need for a debt moratorium was firmly rejected. The German Minister, Mr Klaus Kinkel, said "we must do all that we can to help Russia in these difficult times but must not rush into a debt moratorium".

Mr Kinkel said Russia had until now been a reliable debtor and it was important that it continued to service its debts.

In their debate on Kosovo, ministers backed Franco-German plans to encourage the development of guaranteed safe areas for refugees and approved a regulation which is supposed to enforce a ban on overseas flights by the Yugoslav airline, JAT.

The ban is aimed at keeping up pressure on Serbia's President, Mr Slobodan Milosevic, to end attacks on the province's ethnic-Albanian population, but even before the ink was dry on the regulation the British had announced that legal obligations meant the best they could do was give 12 months notice of a ban.

Ministers also spent some time putting their own house in order. Foreign ministers meet as the "General Affairs Council" (GAC), a body which has a broad co-ordinating remit over other Councils.

Criticism of the GAC's working methods and overloaded agenda even led to suggestions from the President of the Commission, Mr Jacques Santer, that some of the co-ordinating work, such as finalising the key Agenda 2000 discussions on the budget, could be hived off to meetings of other ministers, perhaps even deputy prime ministers.

Foreign ministers were having none of it. Over the weekend they responded by pledging to streamline their conduct of meetings, firmly re-emphasising that they will not see their role usurped.