ABSTRACT
The Northern Dimension (ND) of the European Union (EU) is perhaps one of the least-known regional policies designed to develop collaboration between the EU and its neighbours. It was officially launched in 1999 on the initiative of the Finnish Council Presidency, as a ‘policy framework’ aiming at ‘better co-ordination’ and ‘synergies’ between existing cooperation programmes in the Baltic Sea region (Ojanen 2000). The initial objective, to cope with the implications of the EU enlargement process through the active engagement of Russia in regional cooperation with the Nordic countries and the other Baltic Sea states, turned the ND into a European neighbourhood strategy avant la lettre.
