Differences emerge in Europe of a response to Georgia conflict

If the United States and Europe have sounded different notes over the conflict between Russia and Georgia, an equally striking split has emerged between some leaders in Western and Eastern Europe over the causes and consequences of the violence.

President Lech Kaczynski of Poland and his counterparts from Ukraine and the three Baltic countries traveled to Tbilisi on Tuesday to express their solidarity with Georgia, a country that, like their own nations, spent decades in the grip of the Soviet Union. "Russia has again shown its true face," Kaczynski said Tuesday, questioning whether the Russian decision to halt military activity in Georgia was permanent.

The trip by Kaczynski, President Toomas Hendrik Ilves of Estonia, President Valdis Zatlers of Latvia, President Valdas Adamkus of Lithuania and President Viktor Yushchenko of Ukraine comes three days after their countries issued a joint statement urging the European Union and NATO to "stand up against the spread of imperialist and revisionist policy" by Russia.

In Moscow, they warned, refusal to give Georgia fast-track access to NATO membership "was seen as a green light for aggression."

All five countries have memories of what they now view as occupation by Russia. The Baltic countries and Ukraine were part of the Soviet Union; Poland has a long history of conflict with Russia.

These views from Eastern Europe stand in stark contrast to the calibrated statements from French and German officials, which have refrained from designating a culprit in the conflict. On the other end of the spectrum, Italian officials appeared to side with Russia. "We cannot create an anti-Russia coalition in Europe, and on this point we are close to Putin's position," the Italian foreign minister, Franco Frattini, told La Stampa in an interview published Monday, stressing that Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was a close ally of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of Russia. Frattini is also European Commissioner for Justice, Freedom and Security. "This war has pushed Georgia further away" from Europe, Frattini said.

France, which holds the EU presidency, and Germany, which has close links to both Russia and Georgia, have taken the lead in the diplomatic effort.

In Brussels on Wednesday, further European divisions may emerge when the French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, briefs his 26 EU counterparts on his mediation efforts in Russia and Georgia. Not all East Europeans back Georgia; not all Western Europeans are as equivocal as the public statements designed to defuse the conflict.

One question that will almost certainly continue to divide Europe is the Georgian bid to join NATO, which will be on the table again at an alliance meeting in December. At a NATO summit meeting in Bucharest in April, France and Germany blocked a U.S.-backed push to give Georgia and Ukraine a so-called membership action plan. Both Paris and Berlin insisted then that this would not jeopardize NATO membership in the future.

Georgian officials, backed by some Eastern countries, say that the recent violence should lead to an acceleration of the process to deter Russia from future military action. But French and German diplomats privately said that if anything, the conflict had dimmed Georgian chances of joining NATO in the near future because the strategic environment in the region more fragile. The unease surfaced at a news conference after NATO ambassadors met the Georgian envoy to NATO in Brussels on Tuesday. (IHT)