European leaders prepare this week for the arduous journey to the far eastern city of Khabarovsk for what promises to be one of the most grueling EU-Russia summits so far.

The two-day talks hosted by President Dmitry Medvedev kick off Thursday in the city located more than seven hours by plane from Moscow and just 30 kilometers from the Chinese border.

They will focus on common ways to weather the economic crisis, energy policy, security issues and a broad cooperation agreement between Moscow and Brussels, the European Commission said Tuesday.

Amid growing tensions over Georgia, the EU's influence in former Soviet states and gas pipelines, the summit is further complicated by the fact that the European Union's rotating presidency is currently held by the Czech Republic, which has a caretaker government and an outspoken Euroskeptic president, Vaclav Klaus.

European lawmakers said the wobbly Czech leadership was unlikely to give the 27-member bloc a single voice.

"I have no high hopes of a united EU position at the summit," Edward McMillan-Scott, a British Conservative and leading member of the European Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee, told The Moscow Times.

"A small-country presidency without a proper government [is] unable to command the wholehearted support of the 26 other member states when foreign challenges loom," Scott said by telephone from his home in Weatherby, Yorkshire.

Calls and e-mails to the Czech Foreign Ministry in Prague and to the country's embassy in Moscow were not returned Tuesday.

Yet others argued that the Brussels-based European Commission would balance a weak EU presidency. "You should not overestimate an individual presidency. The European Commission provides enough continuity," said Frazer Cameron, the head of the EU-Russia Center, a Brussels-based think tank.

Diplomats said the summit was unlikely to produce new positions on a proposed energy partnership.

"After last months' nervousness, we are not yet in a position for discussion," a senior European diplomat said under condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.

Brussels has expressed frustration at Russia's reliability as an energy supplier after Moscow shut down gas supplies to Europe during a dispute with Ukraine in January.

Moscow in turn expressed dismay after the European Commission announced a deal with Ukraine to refurbish Soviet-era pipelines, which it said was made without its consultation.

Last week, Gazprom agreed to double the capacity of its proposed South Stream pipeline, heating up competition with the planned Nabucco pipeline, which is backed by the EU and the United States.

The diplomat said that while talks about a new cooperation agreement with Moscow have been smooth, they had not touched on sensitive issues like energy, trade and travel restrictions.

"There is a good understanding of each side's positions, but discussions on substance have yet to begin," he said.

The negotiations were put on hold for a few months following last year's war between Russia and Georgia.

European lawmakers said the security situation in Georgia and a nascent dispute over the EU's new neighborhood policy were also key topics on the agenda for the Khabarovsk summit. "I am really concerned about the danger of a new war," said Marie Anne Isler Beguin, a member of the European Parliament for the French Green party who was in Georgia just after last summer's five-day war to champion human rights.

Moscow has clashed with the West and Europe over who is to blame for the war, which broke out after Georgia tried to retake the breakaway region of South Ossetia only to be crushingly defeated by Russian troops.

Russia's EU Ambassador Vladimir Chizhov promised that Moscow would present its perspective. "The situation in the Caucasus will evidently be discussed, primarily in respect to the consequences of the Georgian act of aggression against South Ossetia and Abkhazia," he said, RIA-Novosti reported.

George SchЪpflin, a deputy for Hungary's conservative Fides party, said he would be not surprised if a new war broke out in the region and the EU was divided about how to prevent it.

"Some parts of the commission probably are ready to do that, while others are not," he said by telephone from Budapest, explaining that the rift went between trade and economic driven policy and human rights driven policy toward Moscow.

SchЪpflin also suggested that the EU's Eastern Partnership, a plan to build closer ties with six of Russia's neighbors, including Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine, would be decisive for these countries' futures.

"This is perhaps a historic moment to decide if former Soviet states have room to maneuver or will be victims of Finlandization," he said, referring to Finland's Cold War status as a nominally Western country with no room for a foreign policy against Moscow.

Yet Cameron of the EU-Russia Center said fears of a new war were exaggerated because Moscow would not want to jeopardize hopes for a rapprochement with Washington. "This is very unlikely, because nobody wants an escalation to happen before [U.S. President Barack] Obama visits Moscow in July," he said, adding that the United States would step up efforts to restrain the Georgian government.

Apart from Czech President Klaus, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner, Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs and Trade Commissioner Catherine Ashton will travel to Khabarovsk, the commission said.

Russia will be represented by Medvedev, his foreign policy aide Sergei Prikhodko, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and EU Ambassador Chizhov, a Kremlin spokeswoman said Tuesday. She added that a list of Cabinet ministers also attending would be published Wednesday.

Medvedev has said Khabarovsk was chosen as a means of showing more of his vast country. By visiting the Far East, EU leaders will get "a better feel for Russia," he said in an interview last week to Channel One, posted on the Kremlin's web site.

His words were echoed by Viktor Lemekha, CEO of the Khabarovsk oil refinery, who told visiting reporters last week that the summit could make "our foreign guests understand there is a Russia beyond Moscow's third Ring Road."

"There are no bears here, just normal, dignified people. And we want to live like our compatriots in Moscow," he said.

Nadia Popova contributed from Khabarovsk.