Talk, Talk, Talk

Talk, Talk, Talk

The negotiations on EU enlargement are
continuing, but none of the key issues will be dealt with until
after Germany’s September elections.

There is a real danger that the current talks on
European Union enlargement could turn into some form of
“non-negotiating negotiations.” At least that’s what Slovenia’s
chief negotiator said during the latest round of membership
negotiations between the EU and the candidate countries in
Brussels. What he meant was that although the European Commission
continues to issue numerous documents on various aspects of
enlargement according to the timetable approved at the EU summit in
Nice, those documents are still lacking the key elements necessary
for real progress. And those elements are likely to remain missing
until at least this autumn.

“Nothing real will happen before October,” one
EC insider who preferred to remain anonymous told me recently. He
was clearly referring to the German parliamentary elections due in
late September. But that doesn’t mean that EC officials will have
the time to put their feet up until then. On the contrary, by the
time the Germans go to the polls, everything that can be done in
the negotiations before then must be finished. That will supposedly
give the EU room to tie up all the loose ends in the last three
months of the year.

And there is plenty to do: in accordance with
its famous “road map” for enlargement, the EU wants to wrap up the
membership talks with up to 10 candidate countries by the end of
this year so that they can be accepted into the union in 2004.

Formally, almost all the cards are on the table.
In line with the “road map,” the EC was supposed to present its
missing recommendations to the member states about the last–and
most sensitive–negotiation chapters. Sure enough, the commission
did its homework: The drafts of the EU’s common positions on the
final chapters are complete, covering the three budget-related
segments of the negotiations (agricultural policy, regional policy,
and the common budget itself) as well as the EU institutional
chapter. The draft negotiating positions cover most of the
principles and mechanisms in those areas and even address the core
issues to a certain extent. But they fail to offer specific figures
in almost all of the fields.

Frankly speaking, this is understandable in some
cases. For example, it is impossible to provide exact numbers for
the allocation of seats in the European Parliament until it is
clear how many new members the EU is going to have in 2004.
Similarly, the common budget, where billions of euros are at stake,
cannot be set until the final figures for the most expensive common
policies have been decided. And no final deal is possible on
regional development funds until there is a final agreement on
agricultural subsidies, and vice versa.

SOME PROGRESS STILL POSSIBLE

Certainly, it is still possible to make some
progress, even with regard to key principles. As far as the
institutional chapter is concerned, the Czech Republic and Hungary
would be happy to get a firm promise from the EU that they will
have the same number of seats in the European Parliament as member
states with the same population as they have. Under the Nice
Treaty, the Czech Republic and Hungary–which each have populations
of about 10 million people–would get two fewer seats than
Portugal, Belgium, or Greece, even though those member states also
have 10 million inhabitants.

As far as the agricultural chapter is concerned,
the EU could make some more progress by offering guarantees to the
candidate countries that they will be eligible for at least some
form of direct support from the first day of their membership, even
if the exact amount of that support will be set later.

Some progress should also be made on the
question of how to deal with the contributions of the new members
to the EU’s common budget remains to be resolved. The biggest
sticking point here is the EU’s commitment to avoid a situation in
which the budget deficits of the new member states would worsen
after they joined. That would happen if they had to spend more on
membership contributions without any corresponding increase in
revenue.

To avoid such a situation while at the same time
ensuring the fluid functioning of the common budget, the EC has
suggested that the new members pay 100 percent of their
contributions to the common budget from day one and get some of
that money back in “refunds” later. Candidate countries are none
too happy with that proposal and have argued that they should be
allowed to pay less into the EU’s coffers initially and gradually
increase their payments over several years. Several diplomats from
the candidate countries have argued plainly that it is not fair to
expect new members to pay their membership fees in full right from
the beginning when the current member states are unwilling to offer
them subsidies in full right from the beginning.

Such questions could be resolved between now and
October. In fact, they could be resolved by the summer, but the
political will is missing, just as it is clearly missing with
regard to the hard-core problems. Why? One need look no further
than Germany for the reason. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s
reelection is far from certain–in fact, he’ll have quite a fight
on his hands to stay in power–so no one in Berlin is ready to
agree on any budget-related issues for the time being. And there is
a good chance that this will remain so right up until the day the
Germans cast their votes.

So, until October, the “non-negotiating
negotiations” will continue, at least with the front-running
candidate countries, accompanied perhaps by some sweeping up of
some minor issues in the membership talks. Then, in the last two
months of the year, a crazy roller-coaster ride will begin, with
dramatic and endless rounds of ministerial meetings, as EU
officials scurry to wrap up the talks by the time of the Copenhagen
summit in mid-December. Whether it can be done or not remains to be
seen. The end is certainly in sight, but anything can happen in the
homestretch. For the conclusion to this story, tune in about half a
year from now.

Gyorgy Foris is a regular columnist for TOL. He
is based in Brussels.

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