by Shang Xuqian

    BRUSSELS, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- Foreign ministers from member countries of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) are meeting here on Tuesday and Wednesday to address the thorny issue of Ukraine and Georgia's accession to the alliance.

    The ministers were commanded by NATO heads of states and governments in April to review Membership Action Plan (MAP) for the two former Soviet republics at this meeting. However, the issue has to be taken off the agenda as it becomes clear that consensus is impossible, particularly after a brief war between Georgia and Russia in early August.

NATO foreign ministers pose for a group photo at the end of a meeting at the Alliance headquarters in Brussels December 2, 2008.(Xinhua/Reuters Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

    European allies, which thwarted U.S. President George W. Bush's efforts to grant MAP to Ukraine and Georgia at a NATO summit held in the Romanian capital of Bucharest in April 2008, are less likely to give the green light at the meeting as they fear that MAP for the two countries will further enrage Russia, which has already threatened to deploy missiles in Kaliningrad, a Russian enclave between Poland and Lithuania.

    MAP has been a mandatory procedure for aspiring countries to join NATO since 1999.

    Since MAP looks impossible at the moment, NATO foreign ministers will now debate the way forward on the two countries' accession, specifically, whether MAP shall be dropped at all.

    Prior to the meeting, U.S. ambassador to NATO, Kurt Volker, floated the idea of bypassing the MAP issue and engaging in practical support to bring the two countries closer to NATO.

    "The problem we have is that ... the Membership Action Plan is now something that has become so politicized that we can't agree to use it. So we've got to find a way forward where we actually are able to work with these countries and help them through this reform process that is necessary and will take some time to come," Volker said in a video message.

    He argued that bypassing MAP could avoid disputes within NATO and with Russia. "If we do that, I think we can deescalate the issue, we can avoid a confrontation and just get the work done that needs to be done. The problem is that if we don't do that, then we're going to face a crisis within NATO every time we meet. Is it MAP? Is it not MAP? What do we do?"

NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer (L) talks with Denmark's Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller at the start of a NATO foreign ministers meeting at the Alliance headquarters in Brussels December 2, 2008.(Xinhua/Reuters Photo) Photo Gallery>>>