The interest of Italy and Austria in the Central European Union (CEI) is understandable. The aforementioned countries belong to minor economies of the EU and have no substantial influence on the worldwide globalisation. The only natural space for their economic establishment and expansion is the central and eastern European region.

The CEI is generally known to have three basic tasks: helping the member states in their approaching the EU, in their transformation to free markets and democratic countries and supporting the development of regional infrastructure. The CEI's plans and projects are financially supported by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, while the political support is provided by the European Commission. However, the basic question is as to whether the CEI is not just a kind of substitute for the states, which have not sufficiently developed in order to join the rich and well structured European Union.

The CEI's November 1997 Sarajevo summit pointed at the fact that there was "something wrong" in the European geo-political situation. In order to eliminate it, the summit proposed for a long-term strategy of the CEI focusing on the "cohesion process" in Europe. In other words, the premiers and foreign ministers of CEI countries suppose that the Initiative is going to unify the two Europes undoubtedly existing at present. If we reflect about it in any way, we will draw one consequence. CEI member states desire to co-operate with the EU more strongly than the EU does with them. This is also the explanation why there has not been any real political dialogue between the CEI and the EU.

Moreover, the CEI could be characterised as an association of countries of various interests, which could be divided into several groups. Although the groups do not formally exist, Austria and Italy could be included into the first one. Both are EU members and founders of the CEI and are responsible for the aid and support to regional co-operation in compliance with the policy of the European Fifteen. At the same time, they have very exact and pragmatic reasons for developing stability and safety of their eastern neighbours. States which are currently waiting for the EU accession - the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovenia, can be included into the second group. These states have a very unclear nation of what the CEI could do for them and of what their responsibility towards the Initiative is. However, in general, they support the Initiative and co-operate with it, because they are expected to do so by the political circles in Brussels.

These states are followed by the third category, which includes Bulgaria, Romania and Slovakia. They are also associated EU members, but they are not candidates for an early membership in the Union. The same applies to Albania, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Moldova and Ukraine, which represent the fourth so called 'weakest group' of the CEI.

One of the tangible results of Croatian 1998 CEI presidency is the initiation of the political dialogue between the EU and the CEI. Croatians, who spent most of their energy persuading Brussels to approve it, managed to organise the first, albeit informative political meeting between the CEI Three, the EU Three and the European Commission at the November Summit taking place in Zagreb. Austrian Vice Chancellor Wolfgang Schussel considers the meeting to be the beginning of an improved co-operation between the EU and the CEI. The Czech Republic, the 1999 presiding country, which inherited the results of Croatian efforts, will soon discover as to whether Schussel really meant it.

Recent Austrian presidency of the EU did not result to any remarkable change to the Union's interest in the CEI. We cannot say that the Brussels officials are working hard on the preparation of a development platform of the co-operation between the EU and the CEI, which already started to be prepared by national co-ordinators of the Initiative. The fact is that the EU leaders have very good contacts with most of the CEI member states. However, it is also true that they are not interested in commencing more intensive relations with the rest of the CEI. The only country that does not show such a disinterest is Italy. It is undoubtedly the CEI's most ambitious member and at the same time its biggest sponsor, which managed to make the CEI establish its Permanent Secretarial Office in Trieste. Regarding this success, there rumours started to go around inside the Initiative saying that Italy uses the CEI as means for implementing its eastern economic policy. There might be something true about it, regarding the fact that Italy replaced Germany in the position of Croatia's most important trading partner.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development also tries to support the CEI. It also several times offered its help to CEI's member states by acquiring credits. The decisive fact for the future of the Initiative will be as to whether the opinions saying that it should gradually become institutionalised and transformed into a free trade zone or those saying that it should remain a tool of the EU for resolving the economic and social differences between the eastern and western Europe.

Slovak Trade FORUM