21 January 2004

The first Weimar Triangle meeting after the fiasco of the European Union's December summit in Brussels ended inconclusively.

The foreign affairs ministers of France, Germany and Poland only agreed that the issue of the European constitution was the most important problem facing the EU on the eve of enlargement. Dominique de Villepin, Joschka Fischer and Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz (pictured) met in Berlin Jan. 16. The Polish minister told reporters after the talks that the meeting was "at times open to the painful extreme." Undoubtedly, the talks were dominated by the conflict among the 15 EU member and 10 candidate states over the future shape of the EU constitution, primarily the rules for decision-making in the enlarged EU. Poland is determined to defend the system worked out at the Nice summit in December 2002, while most other countries participating in the EU's last summit in Brussels supported changes introduced later by the European Convention.

The ministers representing the countries of the Weimar Triangle-an informal group established in 1991 and recently on the sidelines of European politics-reportedly vowed to revive Warsaw-Berlin-Paris cooperation to help overcome the EU constitutional crisis.

Cimoszewicz said it would be best if the countries involved agreed on the final shape of the European constitution before the EU enlarged itself May 1. However, most European politicians, including representatives of Ireland, which is holding the EU presidency until June, are skeptical about such a scenario.

Unofficial information presented in the European media suggests that Poland and Spain, another advocate of the Nice system, are ready for some form of compromise. Germany has allegedly expressed a similar will informally. France, on the other hand, is seen as the only inflexible country today, still clinging to the rules proposed by the European Convention. Still, Cimoszewicz cautioned that such rumors might carry little weight. As enlargement approaches, he said, all kinds of unconfirmed theories will be circulated about the further development of events in European politics.

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