EU diplomatic corps leaves new members out in cold: Estonia

(KRYNICA) - The EU's new member states are being sidelined as the 27-nation bloc's new diplomatic corps takes shape, with western Europe cornering the top jobs, Estonia's President Toomas Hendrik Ilves said Monday.

Appointments are yet to be finalised, but just two ambassadors are being tapped from the ex-communist bloc, he said, referring to ambassadorial positions at diplomatic missions representing the European Commission, the bloc's executive body.

"Now why is that? I don't know. Are old member states' diplomats smarter? I don't know. I don't think so. I do think the rules were made in a way that some people had a preference," Ilves said.

"A situation in which you have two people from Eastern Europe, where there are 100 million people... and seven from Belgium, where there are 10 million, is not a viable way of creating the belief in people that the foreign policy institution of the EU is in their interests."

Speaking at the Krynica Economic Forum -- an annual gathering in Poland of politicians and business leaders dubbed the "Davos of the East" -- Ilves complained that warnings he had issued more than a year ago had gone unheeded.

"Of the then European representations abroad, of the 150 representations, one was headed by a person from a new member state," he said.

The situation has barely improved since the formal launch this year of a new diplomatic service representing the European Union, aimed at raising the bloc's global presence, he said.

Ten states, most of them formerly communist, joined the EU in 2004 in its largest-ever expansion.

The EU expanded to its current 27 members when ex-communist Bulgaria and Romania joined in 2007, bringing the bloc's total population is just over 501 million