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Nicu Popescu

Nicu Popescu OR
Popescu in 2021
Deputy Prime Minister of Moldova
In office 6 August 2021 – 26 January 2024 Serving with Andrei Spînu Dumitru Alaiba Vladimir Bolea
President	Maia Sandu
Prime Minister	Natalia Gavrilița Dorin Recean
Succeeded by	Mihai Popșoi
Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration
In office 6 August 2021 – 26 January 2024
President	Maia Sandu
Prime Minister	Natalia Gavrilița Dorin Recean
Preceded by	Aureliu Ciocoi
Succeeded by	Mihai Popșoi (as Minister of Foreign Affairs)
In office 11 June 2019 – 14 November 2019
President	Igor Dodon
Prime Minister	Maia Sandu
Preceded by	Tudor Ulianovschi
Succeeded by	Aureliu Ciocoi
Personal details
Born	(1981-04-25) 25 April 1981 (age 43) Chișinău, Moldavian SSR, Soviet Union
Political party	Independent
Alma mater	Moscow State Institute of International Relations (BA) Central European University (MA, PhD)
Profession	author, diplomat
Website	http://www.nicupopescu.eu

Nicolae "Nicu" Popescu (born 25 April 1981) is a Moldovan author and diplomat who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration of Moldova from 6 August 2021 until 26 January 2024 in the Gavrilita and then Recean cabinets. He was also Moldova's Foreign Minister from 11 June - 14 November 2019 in the Sandu Cabinet.^[1][2] Until his appointment, he was the director of the Wider Europe programme of the European Council on Foreign Relations^[3] and visiting professor at Sciences Po-Paris.^[4]

Popescu holds a PhD and MA in International Relations from Central European University in Budapest, Hungary. He also holds a BA from Moscow State Institute of International Relations obtained in 2002.^[5]

From 2005 to 2007, he was a researcher at the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) in Brussels, Belgium.

Between 2007 and 2009 and 2011–2012, he was researcher then head of program at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) office in London.^[6] In 2010 and 2012–2013, he was Foreign Policy advisor and European Integration advisor to the Prime Minister Vlad Filat. In that post he dealt, besides his core foreign policy responsibilities, with reforms related to EU-Moldova visa-liberalization process and Moldova's accession to the European Common Aviation Area. Between 2013 and 2018, he worked as a senior analyst at the European Union Institute for Security Studies, the EU's official foreign policy think tank.^[7][8][9] In 2018-2019, and 2020-2021 he returned to ECFR as Head of the Wider Europe Programme.

He has published three books and over 60 academic or policy publications. His articles appeared in the Financial Times, New York Times, the Guardian, Foreign Policy, Le Monde, Le Soir, and Euractiv, and he had a blog on the EUobserver.^[10]

In the early weeks of his first term in office while the Sandu Cabinet exercised power, he called for the accession of Moldova to the European Union. Among his key priorities were: accession to the EU, deepening the relationship with Romania, not least through the acceleration of joint infrastructure projects - bridges, energy interconnection and roaming liberalisation.

Popescu served from August 2021 in the Gavrilița Cabinet and its successor, the Recean Cabinet.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and European Integration, under the leadership of Nicu Popescu, condemned from the first hours the war started by the Russian Federation against Ukraine. Since February 2022, Popescu has played a crucial role in managing various crises resulting from the war in Ukraine, including the refugee and energy crises. He played a key role in mobilising international attention and support for Moldova, as well as in accelerating the EU accession process for Moldova. He was credited with building a ‘diplomatic bastion’ that helped protect Moldova in the dangerous geopolitical environment shaped by Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.^[11]

Under his mandate, on June 23, 2022, the Republic of Moldova obtained the status of a candidate country for EU accession. Subsequently, on December 14, 2023, following a year and a half of implementing the European Commission's recommendations under the leadership of Minister Popescu, the European Council decided to initiate accession negotiations with the Republic of Moldova. During this time, Moldova registered the best dynamic in EU acquis implementation among all EU candidate countries, according to the European Commission enlargement report of 8 November 2023.^[12]

Popescu played a key role in fostering alliances to support Moldova, engaging in approximately 160 meetings with counterparts from 55 states. Additionally, he conducted 76 official visits, and contributed to the Moldova Support Platform, jointly led by France, Germany, and Romania, which brought together more than 50 states and organizations.

During his mandate he played a key role in enhancing security and defence cooperation with the EU, NATO and key member states, leading to the establishment of European Union Partnership Mission Moldova in May 2023, increased military support through the European Peace Facility, and increased assistance for the modernisation of Moldova's national army from multiple partners including Romania, the US, Germany, France, Spain and others.

He collaborated with International Financial Institutions (IFIs) such as the EBRD, EIB, and CEB, successfully negotiating and signing Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation with the OECD. Additionally, he focused on attracting foreign investors, diversifying export markets, and overseeing the efficient operation of Solidarity Lanes for Ukraine.

With his Romanian and Ukrainian counterparts, they launched a new trilateral format of cooperation bringing together Moldova, Romania and Ukraine. He also played an important role in achieving roaming-liberalisation agreements first with Romania (2022), then with the entire EU (2023).

As chair of the organising committee, Nicu Popescu played a key role in organising the second summit of the European Political Community, which took place in Moldova on June 1, 2023. Recognising his expertise and accomplishments, on June 7, 2023, Nicu Popescu was invited to join the esteemed Council of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR). On 24 January 2024, Moldova's President Maia Sandu decorated him with the highest state distinction, Order of the Republic, praising his ‘visionary’ role in foreign policy, commitment for Moldova's European integration, and significant contributions to the opening of accession negotiations with the EU.^[13]

After securing official candidate membership status for Moldova in the EU in 2022 and securing the latter's approval to open accession negotiations with Moldova in December 2023, Popescu announced on 24 January 2024 that he was resigning from the government effective citing personal reasons.^[14]

Popescu is married and has two children.

Books:

• EU Foreign Policy and Post-Soviet Conflicts: Stealth Intervention (Routledge, 2010)
• Democratization in EU Foreign Policy: New Member States as Drivers of Democracy Promotion, co-editor with Benedetta Berti and Kristina Mikulova, Routledge, 2015.

Selected Policy Papers

• Hacks, Leaks and Disruption – Russian Cyber Strategies, EUISS Chaillot Paper 148, Paris 2018.
• Russia's Return to the Middle East: Building Sandcastles? co-editor, EUISS Chaillot Paper, Paris, 2018.
• Third Powers in Europe's East, co-editor, EUISS Chaillot Paper, Paris, 2018.
• China and Russia: an Eastern Partnership in the making?; co-author, EUISS Chaillot Paper 140, Paris, December 2016.
• The EU neighbours in 1995–2015: shades of grey, co-authored with Florence Gaub, EUISS Chaillot Paper, December 2015.
• Eurasian Union: the real, the imaginary and the likely, Chaillot Paper 132, September 2014, EUISS.
• Dealing with a post-BRIC Russia, ECFR Policy report, November 2011, co-authored with Ben Judah and Jana Kobzova.
• The Limits of Enlargement-lite: European and Russian Power in the Troubled Neighbourhood, ECFR Policy Report, June 2009.
• A Power Audit of EU-Russia Relations, co-authored with Mark Leonard, Policy Paper 1, European Council on Foreign Relations, November 2007.
• EU and the Eastern Neighbourhood: Reluctant Involvement in Conflict Resolution, European Foreign Affairs Review 14:4, pp. 457–477, 2009.
• Re-setting the Eastern Partnership in Moldova, Policy Brief 199, Centre for European Policy Studies, November 2009, Brussels.
• European and Russian Neighbourhood Policies Compared, co-authored with Andrew Wilson in Journal of Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 9:3, 2009, pp. 317 – 331.
• Can the EU win the peace in Georgia? ECFR Policy Brief, 24 August 2008, Nicu Popescu, Mark Leonard and Andrew Wilson.
• Internationalizing the Georgia-Abkhazia Conflict Resolution Process: Why a Greater European Role is Needed, GMF Policy Brief; Ron Asmus, Svante E. Cornell, Antje Herrberg, and Nicu Popescu, June 2008.