euro|topics - Will Poland cause the EU summit to fail?

08/01/2009

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Tema destacado del Martes, 19. Junio 2007

Will Poland cause the EU summit to fail?

Just two days befor the EU summit is due to begin, at which current EU president Angela Merkel hopes to reach an agreement on a new treaty to replace the failed EU constitution, Poland is still threatening to block the deal. While several politicians have raised the possibility of expelling Poland from the EU, others point out that Europe has much to gain from Poland's membership.

Népszabadság - Hungría

The negotiations that have been going on since 2002 and the constitutional debacle in France and the Netherlands in 2006 have caused considerable damage to the EU, writes Oszkár Füzes. "Now Poland is making itself unpopular with more flexible countries. It has a lot to lose in doing so: if Warsaw isn't successful in its bid to have the reform of the 27 states' voting system postponed, it will lose political influence and support. The British have always managed to get their way: so far they have torpedoed anything they didn't like about the constitutional draft. The constitution process has turned into a fiasco. Instead of bringing reform it has done more harm than good to the EU's prestige and capacity to act. But the constitution itself is not to blame; it's the muddled handling of the process. The EU summit could perhaps help to limit the damage." (19/06/2007)

Berlingske Tidende - Dinamarca

The newspaper warns that the EU would be ill-advised to give in to Poland's demands for a renegotiation of voting rights within the EU, pointing out that this could encourage other countries to make their own demands. "It's in everyone's interest to make it clear to Poland that there are limits to what it can demand. The German presidency is patently trying to isolate Poland and cast it in the role of a bad European to prove that blackmail won't work. One offer that could make Poland change its stance would be the prospect of a coordinated EU strategy on energy supplies, because Poland rightly fears Russia's propensity to use energy resources as an instrument in security policy... A concession in this area of policy could help draw Poland out of its isolation." (19/06/2007)

Dziennik - Polonia

Piotr Zaremba tries to see the upside of the Poles' blockade. He says the Union must ask itself which path it wants to take: "Where are the limits to its centralisation? What should the balance of power be between the strongest and richest countries and those that have only just started on the road to power and wealth? To what extent should the EU act as an alliance of states or an entirely new entity? Today these questions are drowned out by calls to sign an agreement as quickly as possible and get it over with, but tomorrow they could turn out to be crucial. The Union should not be allowed to become a cumbersome, bureaucratic socialist entity. However, greater independence for individual nation states may not necessarily protect against this. The square root formula could offer a guarantee for such protection, although this may also not be the case." (19/06/2007)

Neue Zürcher Zeitung - Suiza

Ulrich Schmid criticises the remarks of certain European politicians who, in view of Poland's blocking tactics in the debate about the distribution of voting rights at the EU's Council of Ministers, are even talking about expelling the country from the EU. "No one denies that the Kaczynskis aren't exactly in love with the EU. Unlike the pronouncedly liberal camp around former Solidarnosc advisor and Foreign Minister under the Buzek government Bronislaw Geremek, and the first prime minister of post-communist Poland, Tadeusz Mazowiecki, who hoped the Union would have a positive influence on the country, the Kaczynski brothers have adopted a more pragmatic stance and are particularly sceptical about further integration and the expansion of federalist elements - as are the English. But the Kaczynskis don't reject the EU, and neither do the Polish people, the majority of whom are very enthusiastic about the Union. The EU profits in many ways from Poland's vital democracy, and even more from Warsaw's expertise in dealing with ex-communist states." (19/06/2007)

» de toda la revista de prensa del Martes, 19. Junio 2007

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