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The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the European Community

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 February 2017

Kazimierz Grzybowski
Kazimierz Grzybowski*
Affiliation:
Duke University
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Extract

After nearly 15 years of official and unofficial contacts and negotiations, on June 25, 1988, representatives of the European Community (EC) and the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA or COMECON), meeting in Luxembourg, signed a Declaration establishing official relations between the two parties so as to “develop cooperation in areas which fall within their respective spheres of competence, and where there is common interest.”

Type
Current Developments
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 84 , Issue 1 , January 1990 , pp. 284 - 292
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 1990

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References

1 32 J.O. Comm. Eur. (No. L 137) 34 (1988); id. at 35.

2 In the first years of the CMEA’s existence, the general purpose of the economic regime imposed by the Communist governments was a general reversal of traditional trade patterns. Before World War II, Eastern Europe traded with the West. Soviet trade with future members of the CMEA was insignificant. When the war ended, the old trade pattern began to reassert itself. After the Communist Parties assumed control of national affairs, the Soviet Union took practically all exports and supplied all the needs of its dependencies. Economic Commission for Europe, Economic Survey of Europe in 1949, at 146, table 84. Cf. VT Foreign Trade, No. 6, 1949, at 6 (in Russian). See generally Mid-European Law Project, Economic Treaties and Agreements of the Soviet Bloc in Eastern Europe, at xxxv–vi (2d ed. 1952).

3 Handbook on International Economic Organizations 240 (2d ed. 1962) (in Russian).

4 See Kommunist, No. 12, 1962, at 5.

5 Pravda, June 7, 1962.

6 Pravda, July 30, 1971. Cf. U.S. International Trade Commission, Int’l Econ. Rev., June 1989, at 6 (“The prospect of further economic integration remains elusive …”).

7 Voinov, Economic Cooperation of Socialist Stales with the Developed Capitalist Countries, Planovoe Khoziaistvo (Planned Economy), No. 3, March 1973, at 110–20.

8 Pravda, May 16, 1973.

9 Izvestia, Mar. 21, 1972; Pravda, Dec. 22, 1972. See also Uschakov, Die Beziehungen zwischender E.G. und dem RGW, 1988 Osteuropa 605.

10 6 Encyclopedia of European Community Law 1344–45 (1973-).

11 Keesing’s Contemporary Archives 27,570 [hereinafter Keesing’s]. Cf. id. at 24,170.

12 1 Encyclopedia of European Community Law, supra note 10, at 22, 1042.

13 Cf. Grzybowski, Comecon, in East-West Business Transactions 117, 124 (R. Starr ed. 1974).

14 Keesing’s, supra note 11, at 27,570.

15 Id.; A. Uschakov, Integration in RGW (Comecon) Dokumente 977 (2d ed. 1983).

16 Uschakov, A., supra note 15, at 982Google Scholar.

17 Id.

18 Keesing’s, supra note 11, at 34,206, 34,206 (A), 34,910.

19 Id. at 35,806.

20 Bull. Eur. Comm. (Commission), No. 6, 1988, at 13–14; 32 J.O. Comm. Eur. (No. L 137) 35 (1988) (text of Declaration).

21 See note 1 supra.

22 Bull. Eur. Comm., supra note 20, at 13–14.

23 Id.

24 N.Y. Times, Nov. 18, 1988, at A1.

25 Foreign Broadcast Information Service, EEU-89-001 (Jan. 3, 1989).

26 Id., EEU-88-239 (Dec. 11, 1988).

27 Cf. id., EEU-88-230, 88-232, 88-239.

28 Id., EEU-89-001 (Jan. 3, 1989).

29 On Dec. 19, 1988, a trade agreement was signed with Czechoslovakia. Id.

30 Int’l Econ. Rev., supra note 6, at 6–7.

Economic restructuring in the COMECON countries—including the Soviet Union—gradually multiplies the number of enterprises authorized to trade abroad. Foreign trade operations are restricted by a shortage of hard currencies, particularly in East-West relations. Hence the need for annual allocation of available funds. Cf. Grzybowski, Capitalist Investment in the Soviet Union—Past and Present, Osteuropa Recht, No. 1, 1989, at 24–29.

31 European Investment Bank, EIB Papers, No. 8, March 1989, at 22–24.

32 Cf. note 6 supra.

33 Keesing’s, supra note 11, at 33,910; see also note 6 supra.

34 Int’l Econ. Rev., supra note 6, at 6–7.