Thread by @_JakubJanda

(THREAD)

INCOMING: Czech Republic will have the most hawkish govt in our history.

Yesterday, the incoming 5-party centre-right coalition announced its official coalition agreement.

Let me review foreign/defence/EU/security policy plans:

(full doc: starostove-nezavisli.cz/fmfile/0/files…)

New Czech government:

Expected key ministers:

Prime Minister: @P_Fiala (ODS)

Foreign Affairs: @JanLipavsky (Pirates)

Interior: @Vit_Rakusan (STAN)

Defence: @jana_cernochova (ODS)

Trade: @VeslavM (STAN)

FOREIGN POLICY:

- strong EU+NATO focus, Visegrad Group cooperation (note: possible future disagreements here between conservative and liberal govt parties ), “we subscribe” to Three Seas Initiative

- human rights, civil society and democracy promotion is “moral and beneficial”

- plan to “renew Václav Havel-style foreign policy”. Adoption of the Czech Magnitsky Act.
- Support for EU enlargement, especially Western Balkans. CZ to be “active player” within Eastern Partnership.

- “closest possible” Transatlantic Relation (to the US)

- expansion of Czech traditional strategic partnership with Israel

- THE MAIN CHANGE: plan for “revision of Czech relations to Russia and China” (expect a decision on Czech Republic possibly leaving 16+1 as a result, among others)

- “deepening relations with democratic partners in Asia-Pacific” (naming “Taiwan, Japan, Korea, and others”).

Taiwan is named for the first time ever.

Expect Prague to act like the Lithuanian govt on Taiwan/China policy.

- “we will bring back professionalism, will modernise and make the Czech MFA more effective” (note: referring to 7 years of personal devastation of Czech foreign service)

= what to expect: sharp turn to support of Taiwan (many incoming ministers were close friends of Taiwan)

= what to expect from Prague:

hawkish policies to China and Russia

principled focus on human rights in words (hard criticism of Russia and China) and actions (Czech MFA supports a lot of practical projects).

CZECH EU POLICY

- Main EU policy objectives:

open trade policy

human rights, freedom of (internal) movement

effective securing of EU external borders, solid transatlantic relations

Czech 2022 EU Presidency preparations (note: outgoing Babiš cabinet clearly neglected it)

CZECH EU POLICY:

- Using EU funds for Czech science, research and technological innovation, focus on start-ups, want more EU funds for security & defence, digitalisation, environment and post-COVID recovery, transport infrastructure.

CZECH EU POLICY:

- “EU must effectively defend its external borders”. Calls for “speeding up return policy and fight against human traffickers”. Rejection of migration relocating quotas, focus on “countries of migration origin and transfer”.

SECURITY POLICY

- new position of “National Security Advisor” (to the PM) established, he/she will lead inter-ministerial coordination on security policy, sitting at Government Office. Closer cooperation between intel agencies + fight against hybrid threats & disinformation.

- new rules for “media transparency” - each will have to declare its publisher, owner, main sponsors and annual financial reports. (Note: clearly aimed at grey zone disinformation projects)

- new courses for secondary schools and civic organisations on emergency situations

- will do new National Security Strategy (latest: 2015), sourced in “newly conducted national security audit” (last one: 2016), new NATO Strategic Concept + EU Strategic Compass.

- new legislation regulating private security firms, status quo on small weapons ownership

- Intelligence Community Oversight Board will be staffed (note: previous govt did not nominate the 5 supervisors as the law requests)

- increased support for migration camps outside of the EU

DEFENSE

- 2 % GDP defence spending in FY2025, new law to make the 2% spending mandatory, adding multi-year defence budget plan

- “NATO must keep military actionability but also the political coherence to unite the West against external threats (mainly Russia)”

- strong emphasis any EU defence effort to be well coordinated with the U.S. and NATO

- increase of Czech Armed Forces deployment to the NATO Eastern Flank, more Active Reserve capacities development

- hybrid threats focus, “non-democratic countries will not have access to Czech key infrastructure” (note: read 5G, nuclear energy, defence industry)

- support for Czech defence and security industry, including facilitating export government-to-government contracts

CYBER
- cyber security priorities: coordination between agencies + effective platform for permanent state-private cooperation

- international cyber policy focus on: open and safe internet (note: we refuse Russian and Chinese efforts on totalitarian internet governance changes

- state regulators (ČTÚ + RRTV) “will review the licence policy as there is new need to adapt information and cyber security standards to ensure transparent legal and market environment” (read: more security checks over telecoms and media industry)

- “critical infrastructure must be built on safe, transparent and auditable technologies, accessible to accountability checks of the expert establishment to find security bugs and holes. (Read: goodbye, Chinese tech companies)

(THREAD):
What Nominee for the Czech Foreign Minister @JanLipavsky plans, in his interview for @enkocz (denikn.cz/744155/musime-…)

- Czech Magnitsky Act is his political child, he proposed it unsuccessfully in the last parliamentary term as an opposition MP, now it will happen

- “Czech vital interest is safe and stable Eastern Flank of Europe - economical, politically, militarily. (..) We need to explain this within EU and NATO. It is not about our bilateral relation with Russia, there we cannot expect any movement."

- "We are on the Russian list of adversarial countries. (..) We need to adjust our expectations on cooperation with Russia - economically and politically.”

-“When Russia only mocks us, I cannot imagine that it would be the Czech Republic who proposes mutual dialogue."

- "We can communicate with Russia once there is a partner who wants to communicate. Nothing like this comes from Russia now. We do not have a partner in Russia with whom we can speak to.”

- "China is globally on the rise and our core problem is that China doesn’t obey the basic rules of international order. China is an important trade partner, but we cannot imagine China would be an important foreign investment partner anymore."

- "Moreover, foreign investment in China doesn’t have the same level of protection as in developed countries. "

- (In CZ) "CEFC and CITIC activities have faded, China will not be allowed to compete in the nuclear power plant tender, Huawei cannot enter critical infrastructure."

- "Now it is time to set up realistic expectations what we can achieve with China. We need to find other partners in Asia with which we can achieve something real. Here I see a strong role of Taiwan."

- “On China, I am not afraid to use the term systemic rival. China is on the rise, we need to adapt to it by setting red-lines for business, politics and human rights. We cannot call China an enemy state, we do not want to have hostile relations with China."

- "But specific Russian and Chinese activities on the Czech territory can be called hostile or posing a threat - such as Vrbetice (GRU-organised explosions killing Czech citizen), Chinese activities within Czech academia, or organising influence networks on our territory.”

- “This new (Czech) government will develop and deepen relations with Taiwan, since we have friendly steps towards Taiwan planned in our coalition manifesto. The most telling example is policy led by Senate Speaker Vystrčil, he is very friendly to Taiwan."

- "Our government will be bound by international legal environment and it is important to be sensitive in issues related to Taiwan, but on practical, economic, scientific, cultural and inter-personal level we can achieve major progress.”