The new treaty is largely the defunct constitution in all but name, writes Jamie Smythin Brussels
At about 5am on Saturday, German chancellor Angela Merkel pronounced the birth of a new EU "reform treaty" and declared that the union's two-year constitutional crisis was over.
Amid a flurry of pink roses, smiles for the cameras and visible relief among bleary-eyed European diplomats, all 27 EU leaders signed off on a blueprint for a treaty that will change how the union takes decisions and conducts its business.
After two days of intense bilateral talks with the leaders of the three main treaty sceptics, Poland, Britain and the Netherlands, Dr Merkel said she was "very, very satisfied" with the compromise. However, she was also forced to acknowledge that delivering the EU "reform treaty" had been an extremely difficult negotiation.
The scars from a bruising clash between Dr Merkel and the Polish president Lech Kaczynski and his twin prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski will take time to heal.
Jaroslaw, reputedly the tougher of the two brothers, enraged German diplomats before the summit by invoking Germany's role in the second World War to justify its refusal to accept a new voting system in the treaty.
His intervention late on Friday night from Warsaw, where he went on television to publicly veto a compromise Franco-German proposal, almost caused the talks to collapse in bitter acrimony.
Losing her patience with the Poles, Dr Merkel threatened to move ahead and finalise the outline of a treaty without Warsaw. This threat, together with support in the talks from new French president Nicolas Sarkozy, finally persuaded Warsaw to do a deal.
Warsaw's big complaint with the reform treaty proposed by Germany, the holder of the EU presidency, was the voting system used for EU decision-making at the Council of Ministers.
The "double majority" system is based on population size and favours large states such as Germany against medium to smaller-sized states.
The Polish delegation, which brought with it 10 mathematicians to do number crunching on any deal, wanted this replaced with a system that would boost Warsaw's voting weight vis-a-vis Germany, a neighbour with which it has strained relations.
The Poles' tough stance won them a delay in the introduction of the "double majority" system until 2014. Until then the existing system under the Nice Treaty, which is more favourable to Poland, will be in force. They also won a three-year transitional phase for the "double majority", during which they can block decisions using Nice.
The obstinate stance taken by the Poles, who stood almost alone with only tacit support from the Czech Republic and Lithuania, will reinforce their reputation among their EU partners as mavericks. Warsaw also vetoed talks last year with Russia on a new partnership agreement, against the wishes of most states - particularly Germany.
With the Poles coming on side and signing up to support a reform treaty at 1.30am, most diplomats turned their attention to making a quick escape from the summit.
But then nine states complained that concessions made to placate the treaty sceptics, Britain, Poland and the Netherlands, went too far.
The group which included ardent supporters of the now defunct EU constitution, , Belgium, Finland and Spain, presented a list of 16 points of disagreement. These included the opt-out obtained by Britain to the charter of fundamental rights and a concession to the Dutch which will boost the powers of national parliaments to scrutinise European Commission proposals.
Belgium's outgoing prime minister Guy Verhofstadt, a keen Euro-federalist, fought an energetic rearguard battle over a text he said had been "disfigured" by footnotes and annexes designed to make it easier for eurosceptics to sell a deal back home.
It is true that the blueprint of the reform treaty prepared by the German presidency at the summit is an ugly document. The British, in particular, have fought to include a series of declarations and protocols that specifically exempt them from a range of activities.
One of these, an opt-in procedure in the area of judicial co- operation, will also enable Ireland to withdraw from EU initiatives on police and judicial matters.
The Taoiseach's comment that 90 per cent of the EU constitution is retained in the new treaty is correct. What the sceptics have managed to do is repackage the institutional reforms in the existing EU treaties and remove some of the symbols and constitutional language that only served to inflame eurosceptic opinion in Europe.
The hard part comes now: how to sell these same complex reforms to a public, which, in states such as France and the Netherlands, have already rejected the constitution?
Mr Sarkozy can point to a success in removing the term "free and undistorted" competition from the blueprint for the reform treaty. The Dutch can point to the new powers given to national parliaments to scrutinise EU proposals.
For most observers, however, the reform treaty bears a striking resemblance to the constitutional treaty, without the title "constitution".
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