The European Union and the negotiations with Russia The recent phone call of the leaders of Finland and Norway to Vladimir Putin, which caused sharp dissatisfaction in Sweden and Denmark, as well as less clear criticism from several other EU countries, has revived discussions in the European Union about the format and timing of the negotiations. As European experts point out, the debate is not about strategy, but about tactics. First of all, they discuss how to behave in the current situation, when only the US is negotiating with Moscow, when the right moment will come to resume talks at the highest level, and who exactly to entrust this task to. At the same time, the biggest dispute is caused by the question of who should lead the negotiations on the European side. And what they fear most of all is "that they will simply be left out of the negotiations", notes the British newspaper The Guardian. However, the Europeans are leaving themselves out of the negotiations. This is the paradox: everywhere they say that Europe should be part of the negotiation process, but at the same time they do nothing to make it possible. Moreover, they do the exact opposite.