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The summit that recognized the changing shape of Europe

NICE, France (CNN) -- Finding a settlement in Nice was never going to be easy. But in the end they got some sort of deal largely because the leaders knew they would have looked ridiculous if they had failed.

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 REFERENCE
EU Summit - Nice, France
  •  Analysis: Wider lessons
  •  What was decided
  •  Jargon glossary
  •  New vote weights
  •  EU enlargement map
  •  History of EU growth
  •  What kind of Europe?
  •  France's EU presidency
  •  In-depth: Changing face of Europe
 

 Key comments from the Nice summit:

"The negotiations are like a house of cards. Twitching away any parts can bring the whole thing down." - French European Affairs Minister Pierre Moscovici

"I think we are going to scale down our ambitions and then in the great European tradition call it a success." - Jean-Claude Juncker, Luxembourg Prime Minister

"We are not bluffing." - British Foreign Affairs Minister Robin Cook on refusing to end the UK veto on tax matters

"If it's a fundamental principle, the length of the grass doesn't matter." - UK Prime Minister's spokesman Alastair Campbell on why he wouldn't accept changes on the tax veto in five years time

"Unless we were goldfish swimming about in a bowl in front of you, I don't know how we could be more transparent." - French Foreign Affairs Minister Hubert Vedrine on Press complaints of secrecy

"We can't reveal the secrets of the confessional." - Moscovici on why they wouldn't say what had been negotiated between French President Jacques Chirac and the 14 other leaders in bilateral meetings

"We have to come away from Nice able to look the candidates for membership in the eye" - Chris Patten, EU Foreign Affairs Commissioner


If the Nice summit had failed to sort out the problems which the leaders ducked in 1997 then the European Union would have faced a potential paralysis of decision-making as it expanded to some 27-30 countries over the next decade.

Failure in Nice would have demoralized the applicant countries, some of whose leaders had taken considerable political risks in preparing their countries for entry. And it would almost certainly have precipitated another run on the troubled Euro.

That they did get a deal in the end was little thanks, many participants felt, to the French occupants of the revolving EU presiding chair.

The "cohabitation" of a Conservative President and a Socialist Prime Minister, both likely candidates for Jacques Chirac's job in 2002, made the French presidency hesitant and inflexible. Smaller countries accused Chirac of bullying and the French were accused of starting the serious negotiations much too late-after their arrival in Nice.

Summit taught wider lessons

But there were wider lessons from the Nice summit. Though previous attempts to write it off have proved premature the Franco-German axis is no longer the force it was. The chemistry which used to bind Chancellor Helmut Kohl and President Mitterrand is simply not there with Gerhard Schroder and Jacques Chirac.

Schroder is not weighed down by Kohl's wartime memories and is less inclined to make concessions to the French leader. This time they did not even try to sew up the summit agenda together in advance. Germany, which will be physically at the centre of an enlarged Europe, is playing a new, more independent game.

Another factor in Nice was the tension between the Presidency and the European Commission. Successful presidencies usually work with the Commission. Chirac, who dismisses the Commission as a bunch of civil servants with no political role, chose to leave them out of the "confessionals" he conducted with all the other leaders , seeking to gauge their bottom lines in negotiation. Romano Prodi, the Commission President, retaliated by conducting a separate set of talks.

The big countries were determined to counter the watering down of their voting power by the steady increase in the size of the EU. With many more small countries among the applicants expected to join over the next decade they were determined not to be swamped.

Smaller countries angered by negotiations

But the smaller countries were angered by French negotiating tactics and by what they saw as reforms conceived with the aim of diminishing their say in European affairs. It was the small countries who took the summit to the wire.

They fought for the Commission which, to some extent, they see as a protector, and they resented French Presidency efforts to treble the votes of the bigger countries while only doubling theirs.

It was obvious too in Nice that the first heady enthusiasm of many EU states for enlargement has cooled. They like the idea of a single market of 500 million people but they are worrying more now about the political consequences.

The sheer complications of the negotiating process itself, and the need to translate so much material into so many languages already, made some wonder what they were letting themselves in for with an EU of 27-30, even with the streamlining reforms they were able to agree.

There is, however, one rather different point to be made about the The "Bigs versus Smalls" tensions and the bitterness of the naked power struggles over voting weights, national vetoes and qualified majority voting. The divisions displayed and the urgency of argument for national interests showed little sign of any instinctive belief in a unitary superstate of the kind dreaded by Eurosceptics.



RELATED STORIES:
Agreement at marathon summit paves way for EU expansion
December 10, 2000
Deadlocked EU talks force extension of Nice summit
December 9, 2000
EU aspirants: View from the street
December 8, 2000
Protesters target EU summit
December 6, 2000

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