Will Klaus sign the Lisbon treaty? Bloomberg says the Czech President “may be forging and exit strategy from his standoff with Brussels”. And the Wall Street Journal reports:
During the weekend, conflicting signals emerged: In a legal filing with the Czech high court (where allies have tried to buy him some time by lodging a last-ditch complaint about the treaty), Mr. Klaus said Lisbon would strip the Czech Republic of sacred sovereignty, but in a Saturday interview with a Czech newspaper he said it appeared too late to stop the treaty.
As long as there is no clear signal from Prague, the whole EU machinery is put on hold. A series of decisions — about the new high-level posts created by Lisbon (Council President and High Representative for foreign policy) as well as about the shape of the new Commission (whos mandate runs out at the end of the month) — are depending on getting green light from Klaus.
Blair still frontrunner? Meanwhile, Tony Blair’s chances to become the first Council President seem to diminish. Sarkozy, who was seen as supportive, said “it is too early to say” whether Blair would be a good candidate for the EU presidency. According to AFP:
“There will be a debate,” Sarkozy said. “There are two ideas: should the president be strong and charismatic, or a president who is good at finding consensus and who organises the work?” “Personally I believe in a Europe that is politically strong and has a figurehead. But the fact that Britain is not in the euro remains a problem.”
Angela Merkel is widely seen as supportive to the second alternative: a president who is not strong and charismatic, but good at finding consensus and at organising the work.
Preparations for the new diplomatic service continue, even without green light from Prague. There is a controversy going on about the shape, size and character of the European External Action Service (EEAS). Big member states, the EU Observer says, “are keen to see a streamlined service, weighted in favour of member states and with budgetary autonomy”. But Parliament and Commission “would like to keep it communitarian in nature, run under the EU budget and drawing staff equally from the commission, the council secretariat, and from member states.”
Today the European Parliament’s Foreign Policy Committee will discuss a report on the diplomatic service. The EU Observer last week had some background.
And last Friday, the Open Europe newsletter had compiled French press reports on how the big member states are going ahead with their plans for the new diplomatic service. You can read the passage on the Global Europe blog: here.
It seems that the dispute over the diplomatic service follows well-known lines: Euro-federalism versus intergovernmentalism. For the federalists in the Parliament and in the Commission, the creation of the new service is a step towards a state-like European foreign and security policy. But the big member states, who have some weight on the world stage on their own, obviously do not want to delegate their foreign and security policy prerogatives to Brussels.
Obama likely to press Europeans on Afghanistan. In the Washington Post, Jim Hoagland says that three things already have emerged from Obama’s Afghanistan review. One of them is that “NATO’s European members must greatly increase their involvement (and spending) in civilian reconstruction projects and provide some more manpower.”
McChrystal believes that NATO must become more active and deeply involved in reconstruction efforts if the United States adds tens of thousands of troops for military tasks. New European troops, even if the numbers are small, also are needed.
From today’s agenda: Carl Bildt and Benita Ferrero-Waldner will meet with Sergey Lavrov, Russian Foreign Minister. A press conference is scheduled for 12.30, you can watch it live here.
Read on Global Europe a piece by Guy Verhofstadt. The former Belgian Prime Minister and current leader of the liberals in the European parliament weighs in on the debate about the shape and character of the new foreign policy framework: Now we must raise the game. With new foreign policy institutions, the EU will have the chance to become a truly global player.
If you want to receive the Global Europe Morning Brief every weekday via email, please send an email to globeurope@gmail.com