Group items tagged

n the confusion following the failed Lisbon Treaty referendum in Ireland, EU leaders are still issuing contradictory messages, adding to the chaotic situation. In the meantime the Slovenian Presidency confirmed that no major decision on how to address the crisis is to be expected from the imminent EU summit on June 19-20.

The issue of future EU enlargements is proving particularly slippery, as the current and future holders of the EU's rotating presidency expressed contrary views on the subject. The president of the European Parliament then contradicted the EU's enlargement commissioner and the bloc's foreign policy chief in much the same manner.  While Slovenian Foreign Minister Dmitrij Rupel, on behalf of the outgoing EU Presidency, excluded any changes to the enlargement process following the Irish referendum, French President and upcoming EU Council President Nicolas Sarkozy warned that "for opening to the Balkans, to Croatia, we need the Lisbon Treaty". Sarkozy's comments were made in Prague, where he was trying to convince his eurosceptic hosts that the Czech Republic should not halt its ratification process. Ratification has indeed stalled there pending a ruling from the Constitutional Court. 

Three years after French citizens said 'no' to the European constitution, French MPs and senators on Thursday voted to adopt the EU's new 'Reform Treaty'. Meanwhile, the Slovakian parliament indefinitely postponed a vote on its ratification amid wrangling in parliament.

Thus far, Hungary, Romania, Slovenia and Malta have already ratified the treaty. All four did so by parliamentary vote (see EurActiv 18/12/07, 30/01/08, 05/02/08).  French approval of the Lisbon Treaty is seen as crucial to restore the country's European reputation after the French people rejected the European Constitution - written by former French President Valery Giscard d’Estaing - in 2005.  The rejection, which was considered a personal defeat for then-President Jacques Chirac, delivered a serious blow to the project of European integration and left Europe reeling for several years. 

The French ratification, which has to be formally signed and sealed by president Nicolas Sarkozy, makes France the fifth country after Hungary, Slovenia, Malta and Romania to approve the treaty. The treaty introduces a powerful foreign policy chief, a permanent president of the European Council and gives greater legislative powers to the European Parliament. It must be ratified by all 27 member states to come into force.

The Czech Senate on Wednesday (6 May) approved the EU's Treaty of Lisbon, a move that was greeted with relief in Brussels and that ups the pressure on Ireland, facing its second referendum on the document. Fifty-four of the 79 senators voted in favour of the new institutional rules, which introduce an EU foreign minister, a permanent president of the European Council and widely extend the powers of the European Parliament. The lower house passed the document in February.

For the ratification process to be completed, the treaty still has to be signed by the country's eurosceptic president, Vaclav Klaus. He has previously indicated he would not sign it no matter what the outcome of the parliamentary votes. In a reference to Mr Klaus, the commission president said he hoped the remaining "constitutional requirements" would be completed as quickly as possible.

The Czech EU presidency hosted an informal meeting of the bloc’s 27 foreign ministers over the weekend in Hluboká, south Bohemia. Although Czech officials went into the meeting with an ambitious agenda it was the Czech Republic’s own domestic crisis that inevitably drew the most attention. Just days after the fall of the country’s centre-right government EU foreign ministers sought reassurances regarding the Czech EU presidency and the fate of the Lisbon treaty.

Czech foreign minister Karel Schwarzenberg said he appreciated the “remarkable solidarity” of his colleagues, but said their support was not needed at the moment as the government of PM Mirek Topolánek remained in place for the time being. Mr Schwarzenberg conceded that it would not be possible to go ahead with EU enlargement without the Lisbon treaty in force, and said that the Czech Republic would not be a hurdle in the process. “This whole meeting here was to serve the noble aim of enlarging Europe. And I don’t think we are a hurdle, and I do think that – if you wish to allude to the ratification process [of the Lisbon treaty] – I am sure that it will be ratified in due time.”

Outgoing Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek has said he will try and persuade his generally eurosceptic party to accept the Lisbon treaty, adding that he believed it would be ratified before the June European elections. "I will plead for the approval of the Lisbon Treaty, and try to cause only the smallest scars and slightest damage to the unity of the [Civic Democrats]," he said, according to Reuters, having being ousted from power by a vote of no confidence last week.

Meanwhile, the Irish government has said it will continue negotiations with the Czech EU presidency on securing a legal text on certain issues concerned with the treaty, despite Prague's complicated domestic problem. These legal guarantees - on neutrality, tax and social issues - were agreed by EU leaders following Ireland's rejection of the treaty in a referendum last year. A diplomatic source told the Sunday Business Post that the Irish government expected the guarantees to be agreed ahead of a June EU leaders summit, but admitted: ‘‘We don't know what's going to happen. Nobody does. They don't know themselves."

In Brussels there are fears that if the treaty is not approved this year then it risks not coming into place at all. Next year, a general election in the UK could see the Conservatives return to power. Its leader, David Cameron, has said he would hold a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty if it is not already in place.

The bulk of the six proceedings challenging the compatibility of Lisbon Treaty and the German Constitution initiated by the conservative MP Peter Gauweiler and a number of left-wing deputies from Die Linke, revolves around the question of whether the Lisbon Treaty erodes the German parliament's powers of participation in EU decision making.

National parliaments and the Lisbon Treaty Under the Lisbon Treaty, national parliaments are involved in the EU's policy formulation process by safeguarding the subsidiarity principle. It is essentially a consultation mechanism operating before the onset of the EU decision-making procedure and is applicable only where competences are shared between the EU and the Member States.

Three final remarks suffice. First, both chambers of the German parliament have approved the Lisbon Treaty and have therefore made use of what the Federal Constitutional Court has deemed in its Maastricht judgment a key means of ensuring a democratic character of the Union and of Germany's membership in it. Second, much of the academic literature, as well as an empirical inquiry recently conducted at Utrecht University, have shown that the Bundestag, unlike the Bundesrat, is quite passive in using the available tools of influencing Union's policies and laws. Third, the outcome of the pending Lisbon Treaty cases is of prime importance not only for Germany but for the whole of the EU and its relevance transcends the remaining ratification procedures in Ireland, Poland and the Czech Republic. This is not least because the "sale of the state's vital powers" is at stake, as Prof. Klaus Buchner one of the complainants said. It has all the ingredients to become the most influential pronouncement that the German Federal Constitutional Court has ever made regarding the EU.

Legal guarantees promised to Ireland and paving the way for a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty in the country are to be written into a protocol together with Croatia's accession treaty to the EU in 2010 or 2011, current EU President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Friday (12 December).

EU leaders in Brussels this week (11-12 December) agreed to a series of concessions to allow Dublin to make possible a second vote on the bloc's Lisbon Treaty some time in the course of next year.

In order to make these promises legally binding, they will be written into a protocol in Croatia's accession treaty - that has to be ratified by all EU countries to enter into force. "To give a legal value to the engagements made to Ireland by the 26 other member states, we have committed that at the time of the next EU enlargement – whether that will be in 2010 or in 2011, when probably Croatia will join us ... we will use that to add a protocol [on Ireland] to Croatia's accession treaty," Mr Sarkozy told journalists after the EU summit.

Serbia has overcome another hurdle on its path towards EU membership with today's (9 September) ratification by its parliament of a key pre-accession agreement offering the country closer trade relations and easier travel within the Union.

140 deputies from the 250-seat parliament voted in favour of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA), with 26 rejecting it. This means that at least 13 members of the opposition - likely members of the Liberal block, who support EU membership and for this goal would even sacrifice Kosovo - joined the government on this issue.The biggest opposition group, the Serbian Radical Party (SRS), collectively abstained. 

On the first day of the European Council (11 December), EU leaders agreed on a package of Irish demands which pave the way for a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland, which will most probably be held in October 2009.

Under the compromise text, seen by EurActiv, all EU countries are expected to keep their commissioner. Ireland will receive legal guarantees on taxation policy, social and ethical issues and the Common Security and Defence Policy (CFSP), with regard to Ireland's traditional policy of neutrality among other provisions. 

Transitional accommodations  Therefore, transitional measures have been adopted with respect to the Presidency of the European Council, as well as of the European Parliament. The member state holding the EU presidency when the Lisbon Treaty enters into force (Sweden holds the presidency until the end of 2009) will continue to chair all meetings in the same manner as today's presidencies.  But the next EU presidency holder (Spain from January 2010) will make changes in conformity with the Lisbon Treaty, making room for a permanent President of the European Council and a High Representative for foreign affairs and security policy.  Also, European Parliament will be enlarged from 736 to 754 members in the course of 2010, if indeed the Irish say 'yes' to the reform treaty. The elections will take place under the Treaty of Nice, but soon the Parliament is expected to accommodate the provisions of Lisbon.  Answering questions from the press, Poettering acknowledged that the situation was not ideal, and the legitimacy of MEPs falling between the Nice and Lisbon Treaties should be preserved, as their status should not be different. He admitted that legal experts would struggle with the issue. 

Declan Ganley, the Irish businessman behind the Libertas campaign group, of the key organisations that defeated the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland's referendum on the text in June, has launched Libertas as the first truly pan-European political party. The new Libertas Party, which aims to run candidates in all 27 European Union states for the European Parliament elections in June 2009, says it wants to democratise the European institutions, with an elected commission and a president.

"This is a pro-European organisation. There is no future for Euroscepticism. The European Union is necessary," he added. "It is the status quo that if left as it is, will allow euro scepticism to grow." The new party will not partner with other political parties, but rather run all its candidates under the Libertas banner in each of the EU states. Beyond its position on democracy in Europe, Libertas' social and economic positions will be centrist, in order to attract people from across the political spectrum, although Mr Ganley was "not sure about communists."

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso yesterday signalled his readiness to maintain his current team as a caretaker executive until 2010, in an effort to keep all countries' commissioners onboard and satisfy one of Ireland's key demands on the Lisbon Treaty.

Barroso's comments came ahead of a two-day European summit this week, at which EU leaders will hear Ireland's proposals to solve the institutional crisis triggered by its rejection of the Lisbon Treaty in a June referendum.

A new poll suggests that a majority of Irish voters may back the Lisbon Treaty in a second referendum set to be held this year. The Sunday Independent / Quantum Research survey carried out last Friday showed that 55 per cent of the 500 people asked would support the treaty while 37 per cent said they would oppose it and 15 per cent said they were undecided.

These latest figures should a strong rise in support (plus 16%) for the charter when compared to a survey carried out by the same newspaper in December. Those saying they would vote against the treaty decreased by seven percent.

Ireland's deteriorating economy is likely to be an important factor behind the change of heart, with many still shocked and angered by last week's announcement that 1,900 jobs at the Dell plant in Limerick are to be transferred to Poland.

Slovenia may call for a referendum over Croatia's accession to the European Union if a long-standing border dispute between the two countries is not quickly resolved to Ljubljana's satisfaction.

Slovenian Foreign Affairs Minister Samuel Zbogar stated that if talks over the border dispute are not resolved in his country's interest, it would be "quite realistic" to expect a popular referendum on ratification of Croatia's accession treaty to the Union, the Croatian daily Jutarni List reported yesterday (7 January). 

The Czech EU presidency is preparing a contingency plan for one of the most sensitive areas in the EU institutional set-up in case Ireland rejects Europe's new treaty for a second time later this year. According to the Irish Times newspaper, Prague is working on a plan for how to reduce the size of the European Commission should Irish voters once again vote No in autumn.

"On the composition of the commission we have to be ready for both possible scenarios: One scenario is that the Lisbon Treaty enters force at the end this year or we have to act and co-operate in the EU under Nice," deputy prime minister Alexander Vondra told the newspaper. The rules of the Nice Treaty state that if the number of EU member states reaches 27, the number of commissioners would then be reduced. The EU's pending set of new rules, known as the Lisbon Treaty, however allows the continuation of one commissioner per member state if all EU governments unanimously agree to it.

A second referendum on a modified Lisbon treaty is the main option for Ireland, according to a report submitted by an cross-party group of deputies in the country's parliament on Thursday (27 November). The group was set up under the auspices of the Joint Committee on European Affairs with the formal title of the Subcommittee on Ireland's Future in the European Union.