http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0...099452,00.html
Polish threat to block EU vote on constitution
New member stands firm against German pressure
Ian Traynor in Warsaw
Thursday December 4, 2003
The Guardian
The Polish foreign minister warned yesterday that Warsaw will block overall agreement on a new European constitution at a summit in Brussels next week as he attacked the patronising tone of western European governments towards their neighbours in the east.
In an interview with the Guardian, Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz reserved special criticism for the German chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, accusing him of failing to understand how the EU functions.
With negotiations about the constitution ongoing, Warsaw is insisting that it wants to retain the system agreed three years ago which allocated the country 27 EU votes. Germany has led demands to scrap this formula because of criticism that it is overgenerous to Poland.
But Mr Cimoszewicz suggested that the dispensation agreed at an EU summit in France three years ago was non-negotiable. Warsaw might agree to review the system in a few years in the light of "practical experience", he said.
The battle over voting rights in an expanded union of 25 is the biggest hurdle to a breakthrough at next week's Brussels summit on the EU constitutional treaty drafted by Valéry Giscard D'Estaing.
Mr Cimoszewicz said the row should be bracketed out of next week's negotiations to avoid a possible failure to adopt the new treaty.
"We are very close to conclusions," he said of the treaty summit. "In fact, the only really difficult issue that is still far from being solved is the voting system...
"The situation is not easy. There is very little space for any compromise. The positions presented by countries are so different."
Although Poland is not yet formally an EU member, it is already flexing the muscle conferred by becoming the sixth biggest member of 25. By a large margin it is the biggest of the 10 countries joining next May. Its tough negotiating stance is already attracting disparaging comment from west European governments.
Berlin is determined to overhaul the voting system to reflect Germany's size in the union.
"We're not just going to be silent," Mr Cimoszewicz said.
"The irritation we see in some European countries is caused by the fact that no one even thought that Poland should be treated as a partner.
"Unfortunately, there are still many people in the European Union who think about enlargement as a kind of grace offered to the poorer brothers in Europe."
The simmering tension boiled over last week when the EU commissioner in charge of enlargement, Günther Verheugen, who is German, snapped angrily at Polish MPs: "If this is the way Poland begins its membership of the EU, I regret my efforts on Poland's behalf."
The comment sparked outrage in Warsaw, but Mr Schröder recently voiced incredulity at the notion of Poland and Spain, whose combined populations are just under Germany's 80 million, between them having a total of 54 votes to Germany's 29 if no overhaul is agreed. Asked about Mr Schröder's remarks, Mr Cimoszewicz snapped: "That's a misunderstanding."
The new treaty proposes to replace such voting quotas with a system carrying decisions when at least half of the member countries, representing at least 60% of the EU population, are in favour.
Warsaw has dug in its heels, arguing that the place for reflecting a member state's size is the European parliament and not in the decision-taking processes of the European council, which brings together heads of state and government. Germany has almost double the number of Poland's European MPs.
"Let's not mix different elements of European structures," the Polish minister said. "The system must reflect various values, but not neglect or ignore the equal rights of the states, the members."
The tough stance enjoys broad support at home and any concessions could fatally wound an already weak government. "We're afraid of making the impression that we lied to the public in the referendum [on joining the EU]," said Adam Michnik, the influential editor of the bestselling newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza. "Our government will certainly not sign the treaty."
Mr Cimoszewicz said he had reached agreement with Britain, increasingly Poland's main ally on the issue, that the dispute should be deferred until 2009 when the system agreed in Nice is to lapse .
"I can hardly imagine any other solution," he said, adding: "There is no really good reason to have such a hard controversy over the idea of changing the voting system now.
"It would be really rational if we wait a little, get some practical experience and then decide what is best."
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