On February 15 this year, eight years have passed since the establishment of the Visegrad Group as a informal forum for consultancy and regional cooperation among the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and the Slovak Republic. The signature of the Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) in December 1992 and "pushing" Brussels for laying down a concrete schedule of conditions to be met by the associated countries to join the European Union can be thought of as the hitherto crest of its activities, which suffered a strong four-year stagnation.

A historic significance of the Visegrad Four (V-4) rests in that following the fall of communist regimes in the years 1989-1990 the former Czecho-Slovakia, Hungary and Poland were initiators in an atempt to create a "new model of relations in Central Europe." The core of this transformation pursued three primary goals. Firstly, reassessing the relations with Eastern countries by way of dismantling the Warsaw Pact and the COMECON through which the former Soviet Union would give effect to its power hegemony in Central Europe. Secondly, establishing closer and stronger relations with the EU and, thirdly, finding new security guarantees.

All the three goals were combined by the top priority of the postcommunist governments - producing balanced political and economic relations with the East and the West alike. To attain these goals, a regional cooperation, which is considered vital for achieving success of non-regional international relations of the Visegrad countries, was to be used and taken advantage of.

With several years gone, by taking a look at a gradual anabasis of the regional cooperation of the Visegrad Group we will possibly find more negative than positive moments out there. In all-important discussions on the issue of international security the evolution of common opinions split along two platforms. For example, Hungary in April 1990 still sought to champion the idea of neutrality and opposed the Czecho-Slovak and Polish vision of a new pan-European security based on the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) that was to progressively "erase" the Warsaw Pact Treaty and later on even the North Atlantic Alliance. Following a cold reaction from the U.S. and the West, Hungary was quick to change its standpoint and started pushing for closer contacts with NATO and raising the problem of Hungarian minorities. This change in attitude and orientation toward the alliance was progressively assumed also by Poland and Czecho-Slovakia, better speaking the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Slovakia, which was not intent on abandoning the CSCE and more or less supported Russian security conceptions, was shut out of the game for NATO and remained the only V-4 state promoting the vision of Central Europe as a bridge between the West and the East.

Currently it is very complicated to give a clear-cut answer to the question of whether or not the Four should have agreed to neutrality or persevered with the CSCE pan-European concept. Nevertheless, the fact remains that after March 12, 1999 NATO will be expanded to include Czechia, Hungary and Poland, or that Slovakia will continue to be in a security vacuum awaiting either the second wave of NATO enlargement or security offers by Moscow within the new Pact of Stability between the East and the West. Also the fact is the knowledge that the Four has done too little to persuade the U.S. and the West of the harmfulness of a division of Europe in a space between Russia and NATO.

A second disturbing moment that has affected and still will be affecting the regional cooperation of the Visegrad Group is pressure from Hungary on handling the "historic problem" of the Hungarian minority in the Central European area. It will be interesting to keep track of how the relationship between Budapest and Bratislava after March 1999 onward will be developing and whether Hungary will officially abandon an exaggerated and stable-stability-contravening vision of a territorial autonomy of Hungarians in Slovakia which is serving to deepen so perceptibly the mistrust among the Slovaks and Hungarians despite that even Hungarian-etnic Slovaks have taken some seats in the new Slovak Cabinet.

Prior to a May meeting of the Four prime ministers in Bratislava, which is to symbolize the resurrection of the "Visegrad spirit", it bears recalling also one serious fissure. That is an unsuccessful solo acting of the Czech Republic and Hungary toward the European Union. Right this solo acting and a false belief that "we are better and more rapidly prepared than the others" have brought the V-4 to a cul-de-sac in which it has remained for the last four years. A sense of integration reality and a stress on choreographed action toward the EU were shown just by Poland and Slovakia. Had the European Council not divided the associated countries into two or three moot groups, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland would not have been united even today by anybody on the standpoint that it is necessary to proceed together rather than in a single-handed manner.

Thus the Bratislavian summit of the Four should give an answer to several basic questions. Most important thereof is whether the V-4 will continue to be the Four or transform itself into the Visegrad Three excluding Slovakia. If the former is the case, it will be important that its new definition be known. Will it be an instrument to bring Slovakia to NATO and the first group of Central European enlargement of the EU or will it only continue to be a platform to exchange opinions on the usefulness of the regional cooperation?

Looking at the Four in economic terms tells us that, except for the signature of the Central European Free Trade Agreement, it has witnessed none quantum leap. On the contrary, especially Poland, Czechia and Hungary had long not supported Slovakia's idea of enlarging the CEFTA to include other Central European states (the only exception was agreement in the event of Slovenia) or rapidly lifting direct tariff barriers to mutual trade. An extensive stagnation was also witnessed in the cooperation in the agricultural sector and the transboundary economic cooperation, which de facto does not exist. In the period of a general slowdown of the Four's integration into the EU and deepening problems of economic reform it may be necessary to revive the Polish conceptions of the Four's transformation into an "EU II" or Klaus' enlargement of the V-4 to include Slovenia and a subsequent transformation into a consultative body of sorts of the G-5 toward Brussels.

In the years 1990-1994, political leaders of the Four foresaw neither a slowdown of the integration process nor a deepening of the conflicts invoked by the globalisation of the world economy. They thought that the entry into the Union was just a matter of two to three years, forgetting one principal thing. They did not ask themselves whether the Union needs more the Four or the Four needs more the Union.

Hirtherto activities of the V-4 have included only few factors at work outside the central administration - therefore they have only extended to a minimum extent to the communal level. To compare with the EU, a cooperation among political parties, trade unions, regional and local self-governments as well as cultural organisations is taking place within the Union. Speaking of a revival of the Visegrad spirit means speaking of this cooperation, too. It would be a mistake if the regional cooperation of the Four concentrated merely on security, fighting organized crime and dealing with ethnic minority rights. It is much more important to speak of uniform action toward Brussels and especially economic aspects of the regional cooperation. For example, of common production and trade or launching euroregions that as such were at the birth of the European Union.

Slovak and Czech calls for reviving the Visegrad are also reviving the issue of definition of Central Europe. Pessimists say that it will be progressively engulfed and decayed into a German-French-British EU where its identity and history will have been lost. Optimists believe that it will not be just a buffer zone between Germany and Russia but an independent bloc of states jointly pursuing their political and economic interests toward the EU, the United States, Japan and Russia. Realists, in turn, claim that neither is possible as long as we speak of a united Europe spanning from the Atlantic to the Ural.

Slovak Trade FORUM