Irish neutrality was under threat from the Nice Treaty, and the Government's attempt to deal with the issue was only a "tacked-on formula of words", according to the author of a new book about security published in Dublin last night.
Prof John Maguire, author of Defending Peace: Ireland's Role in a Changing Europe, has also dismissed the Seville Declarations issued at the European summit last June as "a political promise, not a legal commitment. The first problem is that declarations are, by their very definition, not part of the binding text of a treaty, but are opinions, promises and the like - however solemnly worded and delivered - about that text."
The author, a UCC sociologist, described the treaty as a Salade Niçoise sent back by the electorate in the first referendum. "Head waiter Bertie, and his assistants, were too afraid of Chef Romano and the catering committee to report this setback," he said. "After sulking a while in the pantry, they decided they would wait a little and then serve it up again, without altering the recipe.
"At the same time, they announced that nothing else was on the menu, and if we didn't eat it up there would be no more dinners ever again. When some of us - quite unreasonably - pointed out that it was now wilted and even less palatable than before, they graciously promised that next time it would be served on a beautiful new plate, with embossed declarations around the edge."
The publication was sponsored by Action from Ireland (Afri), the Dublin-based peace and human rights group. Prof Maguire said his book was written before the immigration issue surfaced in the Nice debate, but he "wouldn't seek a single vote against Nice based on fear of outsiders coming here - except of course for NATO and Rapid Reaction Force!"
He claimed successive governments and oppositions had been guilty of staying silent in Brussels rather than spelling out a principled objection to the militarisation of the EU.