7 November 2011. PenzaNews. The new left-of-centre government of Denmark will keep good-neighborly tone of relations with Russia, wich were intended by predecessor of a new prime minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt. Candidate of historical sciences, political analyst Evgeny Chernyshev expressed such opinion in the interview to the information and analytical portal «NewsBalt», analyzing the current Russian-Danish relations after the victoryof left-of-centre politicians in the Scandinavian country.

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The new government of Denmark, which replaced the previous ten-year ruled coalition, is led by a woman for the first time in the history of this country. Left bloc and left-of-center forces won the parliamentary elections in Denmark, wich took place on September, 15th. The new prime minister of Denmark became the leader of the Social Democrats Helle Thorning-Schmidt. There is also the youngest minister in the government, 26-year-old Moger Pedersen, who is the head of the Ministry of Taxation.

It is noteworthy that the Social Democrats, gaining 25% of votes, showed a lower result compared to previous elections in 2007, they also lost one seat in the parliament. However, the growing popularity of two other members of the new government — "Red-Green coalition" and radical "Venstre" — provided an opportunity to gain victory for left forces.

But before we talk about the new government, it is worth looking at the situation that preceded the parliamentary elections in small Scandinavian country.

Denmark became a source of concern for the European community in the spring of 2011. This time it was not about the economy (the situation in Denmark is satisfactory) but the stream of imigrants gushing out of North Africa to Europe and measures which Danish government decided to adopt. These measures concerned not only the member states of the European Union, but also citizens of Kaliningrad. It’s enough to remember how we were following the negotiations over the "small border movement".

What was the deal with? In the spring of this year National Party of Denmark famous for its nationalist rhetoric, put the ultimatum to more major ally in the ruling coalition of the Liberal Party "Venstre" that it would support the economic reforms of the government only if it took border and customs control of the external borders of the state. Partners had no choice but to agree with this requirement.

It caused conserns of the Kaliningrad region that Danish initiative would become European trend and negotiations about "small border movement" would hampered by new border barriers. However, concerns were in vain. Now the Danes themselves have voiced willingness to rectify the situation.

The desire of the new Danish government to abandon the initiatives of its predecessors is fully justified. The unambiguous statement of its members confirms that. At first, they want to give up what they didn’t have in reality. Parliament of Denmark voted for the resumption of customs control only on July, 2, 2011, so the full implementation of this decision has not happened. At the same time the formal border and customs control always performs at the eastern and western borders of Germany despite of lack of official border and customs control. They have the right to do that.

Secondly, the decision on the introduction of border control was largely dictated by purely political considerations and led to a backlash from the European Community than to real measures.

New government’s initiative to abolish border control had met the approval of Brussels and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Germany Guido Westerwelle, welcoming the decision to cancel the permanent border control, said that Denmark supported "the freedom of European citizens" by such actions.

Representatives of the new ruling coalition were quick to identify their position on the Migration Policy. There are rather hard legislation in Denmark which is significantly restricts the ability of foreigners for migration to the country as well as a former cabinet took a stricter position on this issue. Among its measures to reduce the level of immigration was the introduction of a accumulation points system. Immigrants had to collect 100 points to get residence permit. The points were given depending on age, educational level, language proficiency, work experience and ability to adapt. A new coalition intends to abolish this system.

But it is unlikely that this trend will become European tendency. There are no objective reasons to do that, but softer rhetoric in the migration issue has always been a feature of the Social Democrats policy in Denmark and elsewhere in Europe.

Another important point is the question how the vector of development of relations between Denmark and Russia will change.

It is necessary to remember that since 2002 bilateral political relations have been strained and did not develop. The reason was the fact that the World Chechen Congress was hosted in Copenhagen at that time. Russian side was against it. In addition to that, Copenhagen refused to extradite Chechen envoy Ahmed Zakayev, who later found refuge in London.

The situation began to change only at the turn of 2009-2010, when the Danish side had agreed to lay part of the pipeline "Nord Stream" in its waters. Later there was an official visit of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Copenhagen. In April, 2011, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visited Denmark, and in September there was largely symbolic, but at the same time, a landmark visit of the Danish Queen Margrethe II of Moscow. Dozens of representatives of major Danish companies visited Russia with the Queen.

In general, the visit was not only about culture, but also about business development. Danish businessmen try to take advantage of good political relations while it’s not deteriorated.

It’s important to remember that the Social Democrats, who are at the helm of the Danish policy has previously expressed their critical opinion about Russia (it’s domestic policy trends, democratic values, and the development of the Arctic shelf). However, the overall positive direction of the last two years, gives the reason to hope that the government of Thorning-Schmidt will maintain good-neighborly tone contemplated by its predecessor.

Evgeny Chernyshev