Alexander Drivas
(Strategic Analyst, PhD Cand, Panteion University, Greece)
Copyright: @ 2021 Research Institute for European and American Studies (www.rieas.gr) Publication date: 29 August 2021
Note: The article reflects the opinion of the author and not necessarily the views of the Re-search Institute for European and American Studies (RIEAS)
The Three Seas Initiative and its purposes
The Three Seas Initiative (or 3SI) is a newborn regional platform of cooperation. Poland and Croatia were the main builders of that platform, with the support and blessings of the USA. The Three Seas Initiative was funded in 2016 and its goal is to promote cooperation among 12 European States. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Austria, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria seek integration and growth among them. The geopolitical value behind the cooperation is obvious. To cut the long story short, the main reason of the cooperation among the 12 states is to connect the Baltic Sea with the Black Sea and the Adriatic Sea. Most of them are post-Communist regimes that followed the Euro-Atlantic pillars after the collapse of the USSR. The Chinese economic expansion combined with the European financial crisis and the renaissance of Russian influence in Moscow's backyard (Eastern Europe & The Balkans) raised the need of the poor states to boost their economic growth by deterring the Russian influence... Read more