Czech president digs his heels in against EU Treaty[fr][de] 

The two leaders met in a chateau outside Prague amid rumours that Kaczynski may convince his host Klaus to drop his opposition to the new EU Treaty. But in fact the two presidents seem to have instead agreed upon a wait-and-see strategy, postponing their final touches to the ratification process until after Ireland changes its position. 

"Without a change of the Irish result, it makes no sense to further talk about it," said Klaus, quoted by ČTK news agency. 

His Polish guest sounded more flexible: "The key lies in the change of Ireland's position. There is no treaty without Ireland, but Poland will not obstruct ratification," Kazcynski is quoted as saying. 

But this apparent flexibility could be misleading. Kazcynski recently labelled the Lisbon Treaty "pointless" (EurActiv 1/07/08), although a few days later he reassured French President Nicolas Sarkozy that his country would not stand in the way of ratification. Poland justifies its position by arguing that its Constitution requires that the president must only sign if there is full certainty that the Lisbon Treaty will enter into force (meaning after all the 26 other members have ratified) (EurActiv 25/06/08).

Current EU Presidency holders France, alongside other EU countries, wants all 26 member states to ratify the Treaty as soon as possible to put pressure on Ireland to re-vote. There are no other "problematic countries" after the Czech Republic and Poland, experts say.

What remains to be seen after the meeting at the chateau is whether this strategy is still sustainable. Ironically, if the French EU Presidency proves unable to solve the problem, the next EU presidency to deal with it will be the Czech Republic.