Main focus of Monday, October 19, 2009

Klaus stops blocking the Treaty of Lisbon

For the first time Eurosceptic Czech President Václav Klaus has indicated he will soon sign the Treaty of Lisbon on EU reform. Klaus has demanded that the EU agree to a clause preventing Germans expelled from Czechoslovakia after World War II from seeking restitution of expropriated property under the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. Meanwhile Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico announced on Czech television on Sunday that he will seek a similar exemption for his own country.

Der Standard - Austria

The daily Der Standard describes Czech President Václav Klaus' announcement that he will sign the EU Reform Treaty as a sensible stance. "Hardly anyone would claim the Lisbon Treaty is the answer to everything. But after ten years of struggle we urgently need these new rules for a larger community. They will bring democratic progress like strengthening the European Parliament. If the Lisbon train arrives now things will soon get pretty hectic for the member states. The new Treaty could take effect at the end of the year. A new EU Commission, a president and an EU foreign minister must be selected by then." (19/10/2009)

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Süddeutsche Zeitung - Germany

The left-liberal Süddeutsche Zeitung is happy that the Czech president has signalled his readiness to stop blocking the Treaty of Lisbon: "Europe's heads of government can now start calmly working out a formula to unite the opposites along familiar lines: the obstructor from Prague can save face without getting what he was really after. The rest is history. In retrospect the Treaty of Lisbon will represent a watershed for the organisation of the Union by making it more difficult for obstructive elements in individual countries to blackmail everyone else. Václav Klaus took things to the absolute limit. ... The expulsion of the Hungarians and the Sudeten Germans from Czechoslovakia after 1945 with the so-called Beneš decrees is once more in focus. Now that this matter is again on the EU agenda it is all the more important to engage in fresh, less one-sided discussion of the questions it raises. But it doesn't make it any easier." (19/10/2009)

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Hospodářské noviny - Czech Republic

The business paper Hospodářské Noviny comments on Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico's statement that he intends to join Czech President Václav Klaus in demanding that an additional clause be inserted into the Treaty of Lisbon: "In Central Europe no one can play without coming in contact with the virus of the Beneš Decrees. Fico's announcement could be the beginning of an epidemic. It's hard to imagine that a guarantee for the Czech Republic and Slovakia won't cause an uproar in Hungary. … This is all beginning to smack of the inflated Central European nationalism we saw in 2002 when the Czech prime minister at the time Miloš Zeman described the Sudeten Germans as a Fifth Column [of Hitler's] who got what they deserved." (19/10/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » EU Constitution, » History, » Germany, » Hungary, » Czech Republic, » Slovakia, » Europe
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