Poland’s President Karol Nawrocki was welcomed to Prague Castle with full military honors on Monday ahead of talks with his Czech counterpart, Petr Pavel.
It was Nawrocki’s first trip to Prague since his election in June and came just under a week before a summit of presidents of the so-called Visegrad Group of Central European countries in Esztergom, Hungary, on December 3.
The two men were keen to emphasize in the press briefing after their meeting that they were very much on the same page on most of the issues facing Europe, notably the war in Ukraine.
“There is no doubt that it is the Russian Federation that is the aggressor,” President Nawrocki told journalists, adding that Poland’s strategic interest was in supporting Ukraine.
“It is in Europe’s interest to have lasting peace — not one that would allow Russia to rebuild its capacity for another war.”
Obstacles to closer Central European cooperation
Nawrocki also emphasized that both Poland and Czechia were leaders in the EU when it came to breaking free from Russian gas.
But here, an interesting split begins to reveal itself — one that neatly illustrates the obstacles to deeper central European cooperation.
Nawrocki — officially non-partisan but widely seen as ideologically aligned with Poland’s previous Law and Justice (PiS) government — has explicitly expressed his desire to “restore the strength” of the Visegrad Group (or V4), which is made up of Czechia, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.
“We need to restore trust and intensify dialogue within Visegrad. Common values, cultural proximity and historical ties are the basis on which we can build,” Nawrocki told supporters during his victory speech in Warsaw in June.
Visegrad lies dormant
The Visegrad Group was at the height of its powers during the migrant crisis a decade ago, when its four prime ministers resisted EU efforts to introduce a mandatory quota system for redistributing asylum seekers across the bloc.
But Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 put an end to that cooperation — at an inter-governmental level at least — so stark were the differences over who started the war, whether to support Ukraine militarily, and the region’s reliance on Russian fossil fuels.
The governments of Poland and Czechia have been among Ukraine’s strongest supporters and have gone a long way to freeing themselves from Moscow’s grip on their energy supplies.
The prime ministers of Slovakia and Hungary, on the other hand, have been reluctant to turn off the taps when it comes to Russian oil and gas, and when the subject turns to Ukraine, often seem to be reading from scripts typed up in the Kremlin.
In short, at a prime ministerial level, Visegrad lies dormant.
Bratislava and Budapest cheered Babis’s election victory
The populist-nationalist governments of both Slovakia and Hungary rejoiced in the recent election victory of Andrej Babis in the Czech parliamentary elections.
“Bravo, Andrej Babis!” the Hungarian foreign minister Peter Szijjarto posted on social media.
“Another patriotic government in Central Europe! The V4 will soon be revived!” he went on, while Prime Minister Viktor Orban described the election result as “a big step for the Czech Republic, good news for Europe.”
From Visegrad Four to Visegrad Three?
So, if and when Mr. Babis is finally appointed prime minister, could a revival be on the horizon?
“Well, partly,” said Milan Nic, senior research fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations, predicting the Visegrad Four will for now be revived as the Visegrad Three, at an inter-governmental level at least.
“There will be more coordination within the V3 on the EU level, among prime ministers ahead of EU summits, but it will be very much topic-driven and uneven,” Nic told DW.
“Poland will not be part of it as long as Donald Tusk is PM,” he went on.
Babis will avoid clashing with EU
Nic said he believed that those looking to Andrej Babis to become a reliable member of a sovereigntist, anti-Brussels alliance within the European Council might be disappointed.
“Babis will be opportunistic and differentiated,” he said.
“He understands the relative size and relevance of Poland and the relative isolation of Orban. He’ll try to jump on Orban’s bandwagon when it’s useful but will — like Fico — carefully avoid a head-on clash with the EU Commission.”
Meanwhile Martin Ehl, chief analyst at the Czech financial daily Hospodarske noviny, said that for Poland, geopolitics will likely outweigh short-term political goals.
Poland looks West
“Poland has a traditional sense of being something more than just a Central European country,” Ehl told DW.
“Tusk is looking westward, and the Russian threat creates opportunities for more natural cooperation for countries around the Baltic Sea,” he said.
“We have already seen that during the outgoing Czech government of Petr Fiala: Despite political proclamations about close Czech–Polish ties, Tusk’s government was not really interested in doing anything,” he went on, adding that a new government in Warsaw could of course change that equation.
Considerable differences on Ukraine
For now, Visegrad exists as more of a symbolic expression of cultural proximity and shared historical experience: Presidents meet, flags are raised, anthems are sung.
On December 3, the four Visegrad presidents will gather in the cathedral city of Esztergom, perched high on the banks of the River Danube in Hungary.
But a meeting of four Visegrad prime ministers is still some way off, so divisive is Russia’s war against its neighbor.
A new prime minister in Prague might make Central Europe’s chorus of voices slightly less discordant, especially when the song is about Brussels meddling in their affairs.
But they are still a long way from finding harmony, and particularly so when it comes to the defense of Ukraine.
Edited by: Aingeal Flanagan
