A mist is thickening over the Lisbon agreement, which was sort of a Constitution for a united Europe. The negative outcome of the Irish referendum explains why some members of the European Union decided last month to shelve that document. Polish President Lech Kaczynski is one of those who are in no hurry to sign the Lisbon agreement. To tell you the truth, he is perfectly willing to replace his “no” with a “yes”. But, for him to say “yes”, the EU will have to give financial aid to two struggling dockyards in Gdansk and Szeczin. The European Commission is reluctant to do this because, it said, financial aid to such enterprises violates free competition. Warsaw does not care about that sort of argument. It has developed a habit of solving its own problems at the expense of the other EU members, demanding, for example, that more pressure be put on Moscow when it refused to buy its poor quality meat.
When he was getting ready to become chairman of the EU, M Sarkozy insisted on the ratification of the Lisbon agreement. His declaration left Europe practically untroubled. The Czech legislature still stands divided on the amended Constitution of united Europe. President Vaclav Klaus is ready to follow in the footsteps of his Polish counterpart. Germany holds yet another disappointment, for President Horst Kohler is waiting for a verdict of the Constitutional Court before putting his signature under the European Constitution.
Jean-Pierre Jouyet, the French minister of State for European Affairs, added fuel to the fire. He blamed the “no” vote in the Irish referendum on US rednecks. In his opinion, the EU has powerful and wealthy enemies on the other side of the Atlantic. The European media took up where he left off. It turns out that the US-based Libertas interest group campaigned against the ratification of the Lisbon agreement in Ireland and spent 1.3 billion Euros (47.905 billion roubles. 2.061 billion USD. 1.029 billion UK pounds) in attacks on the document.
Two factors explain the US intervention in the Irish referendum. Firstly, US investors feared that the Lisbon agreement would put an end to their Irish tax exemptions. Secondly, a united Europe is a monstrosity in Washington’s point of view. If the Lisbon agreement entered into effect, the EU would have a President and a foreign minister next January. These plans have been put on ice. The United States of America finds it easier to pull strings in a divided Europe.
16 July 2008
Voice of Russia World Service
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=29771&cid=56&p=16.07.2008 (in English)
