Ukraine on the eve of the Lisbon NATO Summit: Expert Expectations

The Ilko Kucheriv Democratic Initiatives Foundation on November 9-2010 conducted an expert poll “Ukraine on the eve of the Lisbon NATO Summit and the Ukraine-Ukraine-Summit: Experts’ expectations”. The purpose of the survey was to find out the experts’ opinions on possible changes in the NATO strategic concept and the role of Ukraine in it.

In total, 36 experts were interviewed, including the President of the Polissya Foundation Gennady Maxak.
Here are the main results of the survey:

· Experts have dispersed the reasons for the invitation of Viktor Yanukovych to the Lisbon Summit. More than half of them are convinced that the invitation has become a common diplomatic procedure (20 experts), as Ukraine is a NATO partner, and the smaller part explained it as an important role of Ukraine for Euro -Atlantic security (12).

· At the same time, most experts have suggested that Yanukovych would take part in the summit personally. Among the possible reasons for his refusal, experts were, first and foremost, the reluctance to spoil relations with Russia (16), to be afraid to hear criticism for the curtailment of democracy in Ukraine (12), as well as the declared non -aligned status of Ukraine (9).

· The main issues that Ukraine should discuss with NATO, according to experts, will relate to defense reform, Ukraine’s participation in peacekeeping operations, energy security, joint military exercises and possible participation in the missile defense system.

· Expert expectations for the new NATO strategic concept can be divided into two groups. Most experts expect that the new concept will include principles and means of responding to new challenges and threats of the present, improved decision -making and management mechanisms, as well as conditions of cooperation with third countries and organizations. Other experts do not expect any serious shifts from the concept and emphasize that NATO policy is determined primarily by the interests of its Member States.

· Most experts hope that the new NATO concept will maintain the principle of “open door” in relation to Ukraine with the prospect of its accession to NATO under the conditions of specific criteria. At the same time, several experts noted that the place of Ukraine in the concept will largely depend on the NATO members of the interests of Russia, and some doubt that there will be any serious mention of Ukraine in the concept.

· The vast majority of experts have expressed confidence that there are threats to Ukraine’s independence and territorial integrity today (25 experts). Less than a third of experts (10) believe that these threats are small and only one expert expressed an opinion about the complete absence of threats.

· The vast majority of experts consider Ukraine’s accession to NATO (23) the best way to eliminate threats to Ukraine’s independence and territorial integrity of Ukraine. A small part of experts prefer to create a single European collective security system (6). However, no expert considers an effective way out of the situation entering the CDC or fixing the non -aligned status.

· The opinions of experts regarding the prospects of Ukraine’s accession to NATO have dispersed. Most experts (18) believe that Ukraine will join NATO in the next 10 or 20 years. The smaller part (6) believes that Ukraine will become a member of NATO only in the distant future, and very little (3) – that this will never happen.

· Experts have adversely assessed the level of awareness of the population of Ukraine about NATO. The vast majority of them believe that he is unsatisfactory or completely absent, and only one expert evaluated him as satisfactory.

List of experts

1. Barantseva K.
2. Berezovets T.
3. Belyzer N.
4. Bekeshkina I.
5. Vishnyak O.
6. Vinnikov O.
7. Garan O.
8. Golubovskaya – Onisimova A.
9. Gonchar M.
10. Humeniuk V.
11. Jerge S.
12. Zhdanov and
13. Zamyatin V.
14. Kohut I.
15. Kokoshinsky O.
16. Kononchuk S.
17. Krupnik A.
18. Maxak G.
19. Moskalenko O.
20. Paliy O.
21. Pashkov M.
22. Popov I.
23. Potekhin O.
24. Poluyko V.
25. Privatsky I.
26. Podlska I.
27. Solonenko I.
28. Stoyakin V.
29. Sushko O.
30. Timkiv Ya.
31. Todorov I.
32. Tracevich T.
33. Rybachenko V.
34. Fomushkin
35. Yakimenko Y.
36. Yanchenko A.