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Annual Report 2005
International Cooperation ProgramDespite an internal crisis provoked by the French and Dutch constitutional treaty rejections, the European Union is becoming an increasingly important point of reference for our Eastern neighbors. EU engagement and new member state participation in solving the Ukrainian crisis and the pro-European aspirations of the ‘orange’ Ukrainian authorities have become a basis for Ukrainian integration in Europe, although the perspective of membership itself seems distant. A consequence of these events is the increasing interest of European capitals in the Belarusian situation and a feeling that solidarity with Belarusian democratic forces must be upheld. However, only a portion of these positive tendencies evolve into practical actions: true liberalization of EU territory travel conditions for our Eastern neighbors is still uncertain and very remote and EU aid programs are not adapted to current Belarusian conditions. The above diagnosis constituted an exit point for the activities we carried out in 2005. In the framework of supporting pro-European tendencies in the countries East of EU we continued initiatives aimed at promoting the idea of European integration in Ukraine, as well as – despite very different internal conditions – in Belarus. We took part in the international debate dedicated to the consequences of the Orange Revolution, presenting ideas for activities to bring Ukraine closer to the EU. We continued our efforts to promote the concept of a friendly EU border by broadening our project of monitoring visa policy towards Eastern Europeans to include seven EU states. We organized the debate on the common historical heritage of our part of Europe. We supported initiatives to include Polish third sector in discussions on the strategy of using structural funds and worked on increasing Polish participation in international aid activities. In the framework of the Program we implemented following projects: The Enlarged EU and Ukraine: New RelationsThe aim of this project, conducted since 2002, is to evaluate relations between the European Union and Ukraine, analyze the influence EU enlargement will have on these relations and establish methods and solutions for relations between the enlarged EU and Ukraine, which became its direct neighbor in 2004. In 2005, activities within the project’s framework concerned EU-Ukraine relations after the Orange Revolution. Our efforts aimed to promote the idea of European integration in Ukraine consisting of series of seminars, discussions and meetings under the common title: Ukraine on the Path to the European Union were conducted in cooperation with the Office of the Committee for European Integration and with financial support from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Polish-Ukrainian Relations After the Orange Revolution. Proposals for Polish Foreign Policy
Discussion with the participation of: Bogumiła Berdychowska (Polish-Ukrainian Forum), Jacek Cichocki (Center for Eastern Studies), Paweł Kowal (Warsaw Municipal Council) and Antoni Podolski (Center for International Relations). The discussion centered on the social dimension of Polish-Ukrainian relations, economic cooperation and common historical heritage. About 90 people attended the meeting. Ukraine on the Path to the European Union
A visit of representatives of Ukrainian administration, regional and local authorities, academic and educational centers and non-governmental organizations. The visit’s main aim was to give representatives of Ukrainian regional elites knowledge on the practical consequences of European integration regarding development of democratic institutions and Polish social and economic transformations, and to demonstrate the potential profits from EU regional policy development opportunities for regional institutions in Ukraine. Participants visited i.a. regional authorities, higher education institutions, NGOs, regional development, education and European fund centers, and the Office of the Committee for European Integration. Ukraine on the Road to the European Union
In fall we organized a series of seminars for representatives of local elites in nine cities of Ukraine: Lugansk, Donetsk, Zaporozhye, 27–29 September 2005, Mykolayiv, Kherson, Kirovograd, 25–27 October 2005, Poltava, Sumy, Chernihiv, 29 November – 1 December 2005. The seminars were led by experts from institutions including the Office of the Commission for European Integration, National In-Service Teacher Training Center, the Batory Foundation and the Center for Peace, Conversion and Foreign Policy of Ukraine (CPCFPU) in Kyiv. Their aim was to share Polish experiences of European integration and its consequences for political, social and economic change, and depict the current shape of EU-Ukraine relations and future perspectives. Each meeting was attended by 80 to 200 people: representatives of administration and regional authorities, academic and educational institutions, journalists and NGOs. The Perspective on EU-Ukraine Negotiations on Visa Facilitations
The discussion on the perspective of visa facilitations for Ukrainians traveling to EU included speakers: Borys Bazylevskij (director of the Consular Service Department of the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Ian Boag (head of the Delegation of the European Commission in Kyiv), Maciej Duszczyk (deputy director of the Strategy and Analysis Department of the Office of the Committee for European Integration), Irina Sushko (director of the visa policy monitoring program of the CPCFPU), Jakub Boratyński (Batory Foundation program director), Oleksandr Sushko (CPCFPU director). During the seminar, the Visas with a ‘Human Face’? EU-Ukraine Negotiations on Visa Issuing Facilitations report was presented. 35 people attended the meeting: analysts, EU Member State diplomats, and journalists. In Search of an Effective EU Policy on Eastern Neighbors. European Neighborhood Policy: the Role of Member States and the European Parliament
In the seminar organized with the cooperation of the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP). The discussion centered on the future of European Neighborhood Policy and EU policy on Ukraine and Belarus and the situation in these countries. 30 people representing analytical and academic centers and national institutions attended the seminar. Are the EU and Ukraine Closer Together a Year After the Orange Revolution?
The meeting was organized with the Center for Peace, Conversion and Foreign Policy of Ukraine (CPCFPU) and with financial support of the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (in the framework of the Ukraine on the Path to the EU project). The meeting was dedicated to EU-Ukraine relations after the Orange Revolution and perspectives of Ukraine’s EU integration. Panelists: Ihor Dir (director of the EU Department in the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry), Valeriy Chaly (Razumkov Center for Economic and Political Studies), Jacek Cichocki (Center for Eastern Studies), Iab Boag (head of the Delegation of the European Commission in Kyiv), Grzegorz Gromadzki (Batory Foundation), Jan Hofmokl (Office of the Committee for European Integration), Laura Reinilä (Finnish Ambassador in Kyiv), Oleksandr Sushko (CPCFPU). The meeting was attended by about 40 people, including representatives of analytical centers, Ukrainian national institutions, EU Member State embassies. One Year After the Orange Revolution – Is Ukraine Closer to Europe?
Changes that took place during the last 12 months were discussed by: Antin Borkovski (Ukrajina Moloda), Roman Bryl (Dielo), Volodimir Fesenko (Penta Center for Applied Political Studies) and Tetiana Ivzenko (Niezawisimaja Gazieta). About 50 people attended the meeting. PublicationsIn the framework of the project the following publications and reports were prepared in cooperation with our partners from Ukraine, Poland and other countries:
European Choice for BelarusThe project, conducted since 2002, focuses on consolidating independent Belarusian pro-reform circles to build common democratic foundations in their country and stimulating an international debate on EU Belarusian policy. Thanks to the effort of independent Belarusian experts, a set of recommendations on directions of change in Belarus was formulated and published in a volume of Belarus: Reform Scenarios (in 3 languages: Belarusian, Russian and English). Since autumn 2003, the publication has been disseminated among Belarusian elites and EU opinion-leading circles. In 2005, the Belarusian Schuman Association presented it in 20 Belarusian towns: Baranaviche, Pinsk (Brest region), Grodno, Lida (Grodno region), Gomel, Turau, Rechitsa, Mozyr, Svetlagorsk (Gomel region), Glusk, Gorki (Mohylev region), Chysc, Sluck, Saligorsk, Mariyna Gorka (Minsk region), Gluboke, Rasony, Germanaviche, Postavy, Shumilina (Vitebsk region). 360 people took part in the meetings: students, teachers, academics, businessmen, public administration employees, local party activists, doctors, artists, trade union and NGO activists, journalists, local government representatives. PublicationsIn cooperation with our partners, we published the following publications and reports:
Friendly EU Border – Monitoring of New EU Border and European Visa PolicyThe aim of the project is to promote the concept of friendly and open EU borders and advocate solutions that serve to ensure the best standards of service of travelers at the UE bordercrossing and to improve Polish and EU visa systems for the EU’s Eastern neighbors. In 2005, we focused on monitoring the functioning of the visa issuing system in 7 selected EU countries (Belgium, Finland, France, Lithuania, Germany, Czech Republic and Great Britain) for citizens of 4 Eastern European countries (Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine and Russia). Our partners in the project, besides Collegium Civitas which coordinated sociological research, included four Eastern European NGOs: the Institute for Public Policy (Moldova), the Moscow Human Rights House (Russia) and the Center for Peace, Conversion and Foreign Policy of Ukraine. (We do not identify our Belarusian partner because of the political situation in this country). The project was carried out with the participation of experts and scientists from the seven EU states and experts from Polish Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights. The monitoring was conducted in several stages: in spring 2005, a conference for project participants was organized. Through mid-July partner organizations from East European countries worked on the assessment of the consular facilities of the seven targeted EU countries: their accessibility to clients, the information flow and the overall attitude of the consular staff to the applicants while Western partners gathered official visa refusal data from foreign ministries of their states. The collected data served as a basis for developing a research method to be used in consulates and survey forms. The last stage of field research preparations, which took place in September 2005, was training of partner organizations and interviewees. The project’s decisive stage in 2005 was the survey conducted among EU visa applicants in consulates in Ukraine, Belarus, Russia and Moldova. Comprehensive half-hour long interviews were conducted between 10 October and the end of December by our Eastern partners with 1300 visa applicants in Chisinau, Kyiv, Minsk and Moscow consulates of the 7 targeted EU countries. At the same time, our Western partners made telephone interviews with targeted EU state consulates staff. The main aim of these actions was to provide the experts with the abundance of data on the procedures of the visas’ issuing, particularly on the percentage of denials and the claimed rationale for such decisions, as well as the attitude towards the visa applicants and the ‘(un)friendliness’ of the consulates’ procedures. The data compiled during the monitoring activities will serve as a basis for recommendations for better consulate practices in terms of visa availability as well as for minimizing difficulties related to obtaining visas. These recommendations publicized in conferences, at public presentations and expert seminars will help to develop a set of guidelines for future friendly, consistent model of the EU’ visa policy. All partner organizations taking part in the project in 2005 received grants for trainings and research. Displaced Cultural PropertySince 2002, we have been operating a project devoted to missing or displaced cultural assets, which in the result of wars and border shifts were moved to the territory of other states. The project aims to stimulate public debate on this controversial issue, which has been silenced for years, and establish a common position of Central and Eastern European states. In the project’s framework, we organized expert seminars, public discussions and published studies and documents regarding the issue. Private Property and Public Good. Property Problems and Cultural Assets
Discussion devoted to the Polish re-privatization issue and mutual relations between property law, public good and the need to preserve cultural heritage. Panelists: Nawojka Cieślińska-Lobkowicz (art historian, Forum on Dispersed Cultural Assets, Warsaw), Wojciech Kowalski (lawyer, Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Warsaw), Andrzej Rottermund (art historian, the Royal Castle in Warsaw), Karol Tarnowski (philosopher, Papal Theological Academy, Cracow). Poland-Ukraine – Common Heritage. Cooperation and Claims
Expert seminar devoted to cooperation between institutions in both countries since 1991 to protect and access cultural assets (archives, library and museum collections) that are considered common cultural heritage, as well as to the problem of mutual claims and the policy of both states on the subject. Panelists: Jan Basta (archivist, National Archive, Rzeszów), Nawojka Cieślińska- Lobkowicz (art historian, Forum on Dispersed Cultural Assets, Warsaw), Roman Czmelyk (historian, Ethnography and Decorative Art Museum, Lviv), Sylwester Mirosław Czopek (historian, Regional Museum, Rzeszów), Myroslava Keryk (cultural historian, Lviv), Ewa Klekot (art historian, Warsaw University, Warsaw), Serhij Kot (historian, Institute of Ukrainian History of the National Academy of Sciences in Ukraine, Kyiv), Wojciech Kowalski (lawyer, Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Warsaw), Jacek Krochmal (archivist, National Archives General Directorate, Warsaw), Hanna Łaskarzewska (librarian, National Library, Warsaw), Maciej Matwijów (historian, Ossoliński Family National Institution, Wrocław), Jacek Miler (Ministry of Culture, Warsaw), Mariusz Jerzy Olbromski (museologist, Przemyśl Region National Muzeum, Przemyśl), Heorhyj Papakin (archivist, Ukraine National Archive Committee, Kyiv), Diana Pelc (archivist, Central National Historical Archive of Ukraine, Lviv), Zdzisław Pietrzyk (historian, Jagiellonian Library, Cracow), Iryna Rymarovych (librarian, Wernadzki Ukrainian National Library, Kyiv), Janusz Smaza (conservator, Academy of Fine Arts, Warsaw), Władysław Stępniak (archivist, National Archives General Directorate Warsaw), Krzysztof Walczak (librarian, Alfons Parczewski Pedagogical Library, Kalisz). PublicationsIn cooperation with Trio Publishing House, we published the following:
Remembrance and Foreign Policy ConferenceOn June 28, 2005, we organized a conference devoted to the meaning of history in Poland’s relations with its neighbors: Germany, Russia and Ukraine, as well as the role and opportunities of the state in building historical memory. Politicians, historians, political and social scientists, diplomats and journalists participated in the meeting. The speakers included: Klaus Bachmann (political scientist, Willy Brandt Center for German and European Studies, Wrocław University), Władysław Bartoszewski (historian, politician, former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland), Bogumiła Berdychowska (journalist, Polish-Ukrainian Forum), Marek Borowski (politician, Chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Poland, deputy to the Parliament), Bronisław Geremek (historian, politician, Member of the European Parliament, former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland), Marek Jurek (politician, Vice-Chairman of the Law and Justice party, deputy to the Parliament), Zdzisław Krasnodębski (philosopher, social scientist, University of Bremen), Andrzej de Lazari (philologist, literature expert, sovietologist, International Studies Institute, Łódź University), Tadeusz Mazowiecki (politician, former Prime Minister of Poland), Jan Rokita (politician, Chairman of the Parliamentary Group of the Civic Platform party), Adam Daniel Rotfeld (political scientist, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland), Donald Tusk (politician, Chairman of the Civic Platform party, Vice-Speaker of the Parliament), Kazimierz Michał Ujazdowski (politician, Vice-Chairman of the Law and Justice party, Vice-Speaker of the Parliament) and Anna Wolff-Powęska (historian, political scientist, Western Institute, Poznań). Speeches and selected fragments of the discussion were published in the joint volume Remembrance and Foreign Policy. Partnership projectsIn 2005 the Foundation participated in the following projects implemented in coalition with other organizations: Friendly Neighborhood Forum: Lithuania, Kaliningrad District, PolandInitiated in 2002, the Friendly Neighborhood Forum facilitates collaboration between various circles in Kaliningrad District, Poland and Lithuania. The project’s main partners are the Elbląg Association to Support of Non-Governmental Initiatives and the Borussia Cultural Community Association which runs the secretariat of this joint initiative. In 2005 the Forum focused on developing youth cooperation and support for organizations operating in Kaliningrad. It organized a series of seminars, study visits and a grant competition in the framework of the Polish-Russian Youth Fund, as well as trainings for representatives of NGOs from Kaliningrad District and consultations for Polish and Russian organizations and educational institutions. Polish NGOs AbroadSince spring 2001, the Foundation has participated in the work of Polish NGOs Abroad coalition. The goals of the Polish NGO Abroad group include: exchange of information, cooperation with public administration, participation in formulating and implementing Polish aid policy, cooperation with related associations in other states, dissemination of information about the activity of Polish NGOs Abroad and seeking support for their activities among public opinion. In 2005, Polish NGOs Abroad group (which unites 38 member organizations) participated in drafting a government aid plan for Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia and Moldova, contributing to the elimination of serious procedural errors in grant competitions for Ukrainian NGO projects. Furthermore, it organized 5 trainings for members and other organizations on how to obtain funds, conduct social campaigns in the media, draft grant applications to the National Endowment of Democracy and European Commission, and evaluate foreign projects. Polish NGO Office in BrusselsThe purpose of the Polish NGO Office in Brussels, initiated and supported by the Batory Foundation, is to help NGOs take an active role in European integration, promote Poland’s third sector among European institutions and establish ties with European NGO networks. Two offices, in Brussels and Warsaw, operated as part of the project. In 2005, NGO Office activities included: monitoring of structural funds implementation in Poland and the participation of organizations in this process, coordination of NGO participation in social consultations for the National Development Plan for 2007–2013, developing the concept of the NGO Fund in the framework of the European Economic Area's Financial Mechanism, organization of the consultation of the NGO Fund with the third sector, and preparation of a series of meetings on programming and distribution of structural funds. 2005 was the last year of the Office’s operation in this formula. In August, the Brussels office was closed and the Office as a whole evolved into the European Program at the Association of the Forum for Non-Governmental Initiatives, the project's main partner. Challenge ProjectSince November 2004, the Foundation has participated in the international project Challenge. The Changing Landscape of Liberty and Security in Europe, financed from the EU’s Sixth Framework Program. The project is carried out by a consortium of 21 partner organizations cooperating in 17 thematic areas devoted to various security policy aspects and their influence on civic freedoms. Project-related activities include scientific research and promotional campaigns. In its framework, the Batory Foundation conducts promotional activities of the EU border monitoring project and offers expert analysis on migration issues. At the seminar held at the Center for European Policy Studies in Brussels (30 June – 2 July 2005), we presented results of the border monitoring project’s first edition, and on November 8, 2005, at the conference organized by the University of Malta we presented a lecture on illegal migrations to Poland.
In 2005 the Program was financed by Open Society Institute, the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Canadian International Development Agency CIDA-ODACE, Center for European Policy Studies (CEPS) in Brussels. Program costs
Grants
*due to the political situation in Belarus we do not identify our grantees in this country Copyright © Fundacja Batorego
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