Legal and organizational aspects of countering threats to the EU's critical infrastructure after the 24th of February 2022

Abstrakt

Given the importance of Critical Infrastructure, safeguarding its security occupies a prominent place on the EU's political agenda. The current confrontation between the West and Russia has led to a significant tightening of regulations and increased expenditure, aimed at enhancing the resilience of Critical Infrastructure against threats. Despite legal and organizational efforts, over a medium-term perspective, the current economic situation is significantly hampering efforts to continue high level of funding for various aspects of CI protection in EU member states.Varying levels of determination on the part of national governments to enforce regulations and deliver action on CI protection are another factor that undermines the effectiveness of measures at EU level. These are due, amongst others, to individual governments' assessment of threat posed by Russian and Chinese policies as well as different scales of threat posed by Russia to individual member states' CI. Another challenge is constituted by different levels of the effectiveness of the machinery of government in individual EU member states.