EU: The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, has said that retaining the voting system agreed at Nice is not an option if agreement is to be found on the EU's constitutional treaty, writes Denis Staunton in Davos
Speaking in Davos, where he was attending the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, Mr Ahern said he will tell the leaders of Spain and Poland this week that they must compromise with France and Germany on the voting issue.
"If people just stick totally with Nice and don't move at all, you can't do that because it's not going to be satisfactory to Germany. There's a fair amount of sympathy for the German position because they are a large country, they are a big part of the paymaster. We need to look very helpfully at the German position. I have to try and get movement from those who need to move and at the same time not try to put it in a way that forces them beyond a position they can explain to their own people and their own parliaments," he said.
Mr Ahern will meet Spain's Prime Minister, Mr Jose Maria Aznar, in Madrid today and Poland's Mr Leszek Miller in Dublin on Thursday. By the end of this week, the Taoiseach will have spoken about the constitutional treaty to all 25 EU leaders and to the leaders of the three accession states.
EU foreign ministers will today discuss the treaty at a lunch in Brussels that will also be attended by representatives of the European Commission, the European Parliament and the governments of Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey. Mr Ahern said he believed Spain, Poland, Germany and France were prepared to move from their original negotiation positions but it was too soon to say if there was enough flexibility to find an agreement.
"I think it will take some time. It won't be just one move. But if we can get that kind of progress I think then we can get into dialogue. If I can make progress with Spain and Poland this week, it allows me to go back and talk to the Germans. I meet the chancellor the following week and I'll be in touch with President Chirac probably again the week after," he said.
Mr Ahern told international business and political leaders in Davos that the Irish presidency would spare no effort to find agreement on the constitutional treaty.