Strategiczne partnerstwo polsko-ukraińskie i program Partnerstwa Wschodniego w przededniu szczytu w Warszawie we wrześniu 2011 roku

Upon the restitution of Ukrainian independence in 1991, the Polish-Ukrainian relations, next to the relations with Russian Federation, became central to polish foreign policy towards its direct neighbours in the East. In August 1993, for the first time since Ukraine’s definitive emancipation from the tutelage of Moscow, the Prime Minister Hanna Suchocka defined the relation between Warsaw and Kiev as a strategic partnership. Since then it has been treated almost as a magic spell which was usually used to compensate the lack of real content to fill the political declarations at different levels. Warsaw’s special hopes were associated with the Eastern Partnership, the first complete initiative introduced into the European Union’s external relations and addressed to Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine. A Joint Declaration was adopted in May 2009 in Prague during an official presentation of the new initiative of the European Union. Thus, the Eastern Partnership became an integral part of the European Union’s policy towards the countries addressed in the program. Fulfilment of the assumptions outlined in The Eastern Partnership with a substantive content is in spe will lead to a real integration of the partner countries and national and ethnic minorities residing in their territory with the European Union, and in the longer term lead to full integration. Guided by the EU’s values , standards and norms the writers and animators of the Eastern Partnership built its functioning on three basic principles:, co-ownership, differentiation and conditionality. They also outlined the areas of cooperation with countries covered by the partnership in such fields as human rights, market economy, sustainable development, efficient and effective management, energy security and others. Considering the Eastern Partnership in this form, amongst other, Poland should concentrate its efforts on activities aimed at introducing Ukrainian issues at various forms of international cooperation, determining the relationship between the Eastern Partnership and other regional organizations promoted by the European Union, further institutional placement of the Eastern Partnership within the framework of the European Union, and in purely practical dimension on liberalization of visa regime with the perspective of its abolition.