Suchergebnisse

The study examines results of the accession negotiations of the Czech Republic to the European Union (1998-2000). The main research questions are: how to measure success or failure in the accession negotiations? Are the conditions of the Czech Republic's entry well negotiated? Why are the results of the negotiations the way they are? The study demonstrates that the abilities of negotiators influence the results of the accession negotiations. This confirms the hypothesis that negotiators' abilities, their strategy, & tactics matters in this specific & highly asymmetric negotiations, although the character of the accession negotiations would presume that those should have only minor role in the accession talks. The analysis studies the influence of the negotiators' abilities in the good results in the area of the transitional periods as well as in the relatively less successful outcomes in the financial deal. Although a direct correlation between the effective strategy/tactics & successful results as well as between the incompetent or missing strategy/tactics & unsuccessful outcomes was not found, the study proves the impact of the individual as well as collective strategy/tactics of the candidates. The Czech Republic individually, as well as in the cooperation with other candidates, achieved not only expected minor concessions but was also able to change the original position of the EU & even the EU methodology. The strategy of the Czech foreign policy towards the bilateral disputes with the member states (nuclear power Temein, Benes decrees) could influence the low sum of the future Czech income for the years 2004-2006 from the EU budget, although the resultant amount was mainly determined by the objective reasons in the distribution of the finances among the candidates. Appendixes, References. Adapted from the source document.

This article deals with the nexus between organized crime and terrorism in the region of post-Soviet Chechnya, and the primary goal is to show the connection between the phenomenon of organized crime and non-state armed actors who are generally labelled as terrorists. As a framework for the analysis, we chose the 'Crime-Terror Nexus' typology of Tamara Makarenko. As organized crime and terrorism are interconnected in Chechnya, the organized crime groups in post-Soviet Chechnya usually employ terrorist tactics (and vice versa) for operational purposes. However, in some periods we can find examples of a strong convergence in which criminal and terrorist organizations could merge into a single entity that initially displays characteristics of both types of groups simultaneously. The article also shows that it is very difficult to categorize some Chechen actors, especially those involved in terrorist activities. Adapted from the source document.