Berlin - EU countries should stop treating Poland and the Czech Republic as annoying beggars and agree a fixed timetable for enlargement, EU Commissioner Mr Gunter Verheugen said yesterday in Berlin, writes Derek Scally.
Mr Verheugen, who holds the enlargement portfolio, said he hoped member-states would draw up a specific timetable for admitting new states at an EU summit in Sweden next month. Any foot-dragging risked making accession states more critical and Euro-sceptical, Mr Verheugen said.
He was addressing the Party of European Socialists (PES), a grouping of European social democratic parties.
Under pressure from British Foreign Secretary Mr Robin Cook, an agreed text was watered down to stop short of advocating a European constitution and federal Europe, as suggested by German Chancellor Mr Gerhard Schroder in a leaked party document last week.
