Prerequisites for the creation of Visegrád Group in the context of international political and economic situation in Europe

The subject of this research is the historical conditions for the creation of Visegrád Group – subregional organization of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland. The collapse of the system of pro-communist regimes in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe allowed the local dissident circles to create the “ideological” framework for subregional organization, which is based on the idea of the Central European identity. In the late 1980s, the idea of subregional cooperation in the socialist camp won support of a number of Western European countries. However, the initiative on the development regional cooperation in Central and Eastern Europe was taken over by the United States. The United States prompted the decision of the G7 member-states on the transfer of the European Commission a coordinating role in assisting Poland and Hungary as the flagships for conducting political and economic liberalization in Central and Eastern Europe. The novelty of this research consists in the analysis of attempts of subregional cooperation outside the framework of the European Economic Community in the late 1980s. Attention is also given to the previously unstudied criticism of the process of accession of the countries of Visegrád Group to the European Economic Community. Critical assessments substantiated by ineffectiveness of the programs of assisting the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, as well as by posing threats to the stability of the European Economic Community member-states due to inclusion of the former socialist countries into the united Europe. The main conclusion lies in the statement that the collapse of the socialist camp at the turn of the 1980s – 1990s actualized the pursuit of identity in the new world by the Central and Eastern European countries. The oath of European integration was selected as a universal method for solution of this problem. However, regional cooperation remained a relevant question, since rapprochement with the Western Europe alone could not eliminate all the contradictions between the countries. The cooperation between Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia became the most successful example of such cooperation and served as the prototype for creation of other subregional structures.

Quantification of Regional Ozone Pollution Characteristics and Its Temporal Evolution: Insights from Identification of the Impacts of Meteorological Conditions and Emissions

Ozone (O3) pollution has become the major new challenge after the suppression of PM2.5 to levels below the standard for the Pearl River Delta (PRD). O3 can be transported between nearby stations due to its longevity, leading stations with a similar concentration in a state of aggregation, which is an alleged regional issue. Investigations in such regional characteristics were rarely involved ever. In this study, the aggregation (reflected by the global Moran’s I index, GM), its temporal evolution, and the impacts from meteorological conditions and both local (i.e., produced within the PRD) and non-local (i.e., transported from outside the PRD) contributions were explored by spatial analysis and statistical modeling based on observation data. The results from 2007 to 2018 showed that the GM was positive overall, implying that the monitoring stations were surrounded by stations with similar ozone levels, especially during ozone seasons. State of aggregation was reinforced from 2007 to 2012, and remained stable thereafter. Further investigations revealed that GM values were independent of meteorological conditions, while closely related to local and non-local contributions, and its temporal variations were driven only by local contributions. Then, the correlation (R2) between O3 and meteorology was identified. Result demonstrated that the westerly belonged to temperature (T) and surface solar radiation (SSR) sensitive regions and the correlation between ozone and the two became intense with time. Relative humidity (RH) showed a negative correlation with ozone in most areas and periods, whereas correlations with u and v were positive for northerly winds and negative for southerly winds. Two important key points of such investigation are that, firstly, we defined the features of ozone pollution by characterizing the temporal variations in spatial discrepancies among all stations, secondly, we highlighted the significance of subregional cooperation within the PRD and regional cooperation with external environmental organizations.

PROBLEMS AND PROSPECTS OF COOPERATION OF THE BORDER REGIONS OF UKRAINE, ROMANIA, MOLDOVA AND SLOVAKIA

The purpose of the paper is to outline the legal framework for the development of Ukrainian- Moldovan, Ukrainian-Slovak and Ukrainian-Romanian transborder regions (TBR), in particular in the context of intergovernmental agreements, national legislation on issues of cross-border cooperation, agreements between local authorities and regional cross-border regulatory support. The international cooperation of the Western region of Ukraine from the side of the authorities is focused mainly on the western vector, on relations with Poland. In our view, such regional policy leads to increasing regional differences in the socio-economic development of the Lviv and Ivano-Frankivsk regions, in particular their northern and southern parts. The intensification of the cross-border cooperation with Romania will create promising conditions for the transformation of a number of southern regions of the Carpathian region into a zone of accelerated economic development. This can be done through the development of transport, tourism and recreation, finance, logistics infrastructure, which will increase the attractiveness of the territories. And for this it is necessary to create an economic climate in the southern districts of the region, which would help attract foreign investment, especially Romanian, possibly by creating special or free economic zones there. The region has significant untapped potential of the Ukrainian-Romanian interaction that can be harnessed. The Ukrainian-Slovak and Ukrainian-Moldovan cooperation should also be strengthened in the region, the latter especially for the purpose of the European integration of Ukraine and Moldova. To this end, the article outlines the regulatory framework for the development of the Ukrainian-Moldovan, Ukrainian-Slovak and Ukrainian-Romanian transborder regions, in particular in the context of interstate agreements, national legislation on cross-border cooperation, agreements between local authorities and regional transborder security. The article describes the current state of subregional cooperation within the transborder regions, identifies the problematic issues of such cooperation, as well as reveals its content through the lens of the Euroregional cooperation. Methodogy. The dialectical method of scientific knowledge, method of analysis and synthesis, comparative method, method of data generalization are used in the paper. Results of the research. A description of the current state of subregional cooperation within the framework of the TBR is given, the problems of such cooperation are revealed, and its content is revealed through the prism of Euroregional cooperation. The key international projects of the development of the transborder regions were identified and their content and significance were analyzed for the improvement of the ecological safety of TBR, their entrepreneurship development, activation of innovation activities, the development of the border infrastructure, deepening of cultural interaction, improvement of urban development, revival of trade and investment activity in the above-mentioned transborder regions. The perspective directions of development of these TBRs are determined.

Evolutionary mechanism for subregional cooperation: Evidence from provincial subregion in Central China

Against the backdrop of regional integration, subregions with border effects have become the bottleneck in securing the sustainable development of cross-border cooperation. Based on the discussion of the subregions and subregional cooperation in China, this article put forward three theoretical hypotheses with eight typical provincial subregions in Central China as examples. Combined with relevant models, variables and data, the study tested the evolutionary mechanism of subregional cooperation. The main conclusions include: (a) internal factors contribute to better provincial subregional cooperation; (b) geographical and institutional arrangements significantly affect subregional cooperation, with the shielding effect being the dominant border effect and (c) spatial heterogeneity of high-tech industries has an inverted U-shaped effect on subregional cooperation.

DEFENSE COOPERATION IN EUROPE: SUBREGIONAL LEVEL

The evolution of subregional cooperation among European nations in security and defense area is the topic of the article. It describes sub-regionalism as a phenomenon and explains the reasons why small states of Europe are eager to cooperate in defense area after the end of the Cold War. Such cooperation is analyzed within the broader context of European integration - a trend which still has a great impact on sub-regional cooperation in certain parts of a common EU and NATO space. According to the article former socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe as well as some European neutral states viewed sub-regional groupings as means of security enhancement in a period of transition - a time when these countries were getting ready for fully-fledged integration into European or Euro-Atlantic organizations. Nevertheless, subregional groupings have become even more relevant while EU and NATO enlargements were slowing down. So called threat perception gap among individual members of the EU and NATO contributed to forming of small subregional groupings based on members' security common vision and their aspiration to reach common goals. These groupings estimated as marginal by pan -European organizations, are extremely important for the grouped countries themselves. For European Union and the North Atlantic Alliance it is not easy to govern these subregional trends of multinational cooperation and synchronize them with European and Euro-Atlantic integration as such.

31 The Indian Ocean and the Law of the Sea: A Work in Progress

This chapter assesses the implementation of the law of the sea in the Indian Ocean. It begins by providing a definition and general description of the Indian Ocean. It then discusses maritime zones and boundaries and regional and subregional cooperation. The practice of Indian Ocean coastal States generally shows a large measure of consistency with the UN Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (LOSC) as regards the extent of maritime zones. A considerable divergence from the LOSC exists in the case of straight baselines, whereas in the case of archipelagic baselines there is conformity to the Convention, suggesting that the numerical controls contained in Article 47 have been more effective.