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In May 2010, the Heinrich-Böll-Foundation and the Democratization Policy Council organized a policy roundtable in Berlin: “How to stop Bosnia and Herzegovina from further deteriorating? Time for a new transatlantic initiative”. The expert meeting brought together policy makers and analysts from Europe and America, including representatives from international organizations in Bosnia, with their counterparts from Germany.

Shortly after a new ruling coalition formed Slovakia’s new center-right government, a small shock wave rolled through Europe. First the Slovak government and then parliament voted to withhold Slovakia’s share of a European bailout loan for Greece’s embattled economy. Not that Slovakia’s minute share of the package would mean a lot for the eurozone – the decision’s importance lay in its symbolism and, therefore, in politics.

Ukraine is an eastern outpost for the West and a western threshold of Europe for the East. The country needs strategic thinking today, and the EU’s Eastern Partnership can help achieve this.

The European Union’s need for improved policy toward its eastern neighbors is increasing. To date, however, neither the European Union nor its member states have found a sustainable strategic approach to developments in the European neighborhood.

There are two alternatives - either gradual convergence of the EU’s and Russia’s policies toward the countries, or a new period of competition. Then we could get an answer to the question of whether the EP can be a uniting platform for new relations between Russia and the EU, or whether it will be a source of discord?

To open up with the conclusion of this piece: The short war between Russian and Georgian forces in 2008 has not altered the strategic landscape of Europe. Rather, the clash has cleared the air from the smog of illusionary rhetoric about a new order for the continent. After the fact, the realities of power and dependence, of cooperation and conflict, the dilemmas of order and principle have become more obvious and debatable.

Soon after 2000, the European Union (EU) began to aspire to an increasingly robust role in conflict prevention and resolution in the South Caucasus. It sought to expand its role in the Georgian-Abkhaz, Georgian-Ossetian and Nagorno-Karabakh conflict resolution efforts. A turning point for its engagement was the 2008 Georgian-Russian war. The EU’s speedy response to that crisis was impressive and the Union has been actively engaged in addressing that conflict since.

Before 1989 the world was much simpler. Belonging to the Western camp and projecting decent democratic credentials guaranteed that a country would sooner or later be welcomed into the fold of European and Euro-Atlantic organisations. Today, the relationship between the European Union (EU) and its Eastern neighbours is much more complicated, as the ultimate question of 'Europe's borders' continues to haunt the EU and its members.

This paper summarizes discussions held during a transatlantic workshop at the Brookings Institution on June 1. The purpose of the workshop was to analyze the impact of the Lisbon Treaty on critical security issues affecting the transatlantic relationship between the United States and the EU. The workshop focused on four topics: Russia; Iran; China and “AfPak”. A summary by

Jens Siegert, head of the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung in Moscow, states in a commentary article that a verdict of "not guilty" in the Khodorkovsky-Lebedev trial may show a sign of political weakness on behalf of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, while a "guilty" verdict could end all hope for a thorough modernization of Russia.