SECURITY IN CENTRAL EASTERN EUROPE: EASTERN PARTNERSHIP LOOKING TOWARDS RIGA SUMMIT

The aftermath of the Vilnius Summit raised many questions regarding the effectiveness of the European foreign policy in the Eastern partnership countries. The previous incidents show the imperious need of a security dimension for the Eastern Partnership. A new European security system is required to offer better solutions to a region that struggles with the annexation of Crimea, violent conflicts in the Donbas area in Eastern Ukraine, the 2008 Georgian-Russian war and the five frozen conflicts at the Eastern frontier of the EU. In this paper, I will present from a macro-level analysis the main transformations and challenges of the Eastern Partnership after the Vilnius Summit until the Riga Summit2, elaborate on the expectations from the upcoming Riga Summit and its importance in the actual context and offer some insights in the main reasons why controlling the Eastern neighbourhood is important for both European and Russian security.