During the Atlantic Council PISM Global Forum 2017 in Warsaw the President of Croatia announced that the 3Seas countries would ask the European Commission to create a special fund for the construction of new infrastructure in the region. The leaders of Bulgaria, Croatia and Estonia talked about its potential.
„The initiative has become significantly recognizable at the international level,” said Croatia’s President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović. „The goal is to increase the number of connections. After the fall of the Berlin Wall we neglected the links on the North-South axis. Currently few people travel from Zagreb to Vienna by train and it takes as much time as it did in the times of the Austria-Hungary Empire.”
„We are done talking. It’s time for pragmatic actions,” assessed Rumen Radev, Bulgaria’s President.
„There is another important element. We have to talk to partners from all over the world. We have to invite investors from the US, China and other countries. This is our goal.”
„The Central and Eastern European countries should be connected with the Southern Corridor. This is important for diversification. We will also cooperate with Greece regarding the construction of an LNG terminal,” said the Bulgarian leader.
„I am here to show Estonian companies that in the south, the market has 100 million people,” said Kersti Kaljulaid, the President of Estonia. She also added that the country was integrated with the Scandinavian market, but it was also worth searching for new perspectives.”We are still not using all the possibilities offered by those markets. Capital flows show we are focused on the north.”
„If we have enough infrastructural connections nobody will be able to blackmail us when it comes to the supply of energy sources,” she said.
„We have a lot of infrastructural projects in Europe. They are often spanned between north and south. This is not only our problem, but Western Europe’s as well,” the President said. In her opinion the entire Europe has the same problems. „This is about pan-European cooperation, not about the division between the East and the West.”
The Estonian President also mentioned that her country was interested in the Rail Baltica project.
„This initiative is not against the European Union, Russia or Germany. This is not the US’s Trojan horse in Russia. This is about increasing the competitiveness of economies, which will increase the competitiveness of economies in the entire Union,” Croatia’s President summed up. „This is an informal platform, but it has political support.”