A chara, - In your edition of May 25th, Denis Staunton reports that there are no emergency measures for EU enlargement should Ireland reject the Nice Treaty for the second time. Despite reassurances from anti-Nice lobbies that the No vote had nothing to do with enlargement and that it will not affect enlargement, there is no indication that is the case. The Amsterdam Treaty is clear about it: if more than five countries are going to join the Community, the reforms of the EU institutions have to take place to accommodate new members.
The Nice Treaty, drafted with extreme difficulty and balancing many different points of view, provides a basis for this reform. Unfortunately for the candidate states preparing for that historic moment for the past eight years, the final decision regarding 105 million people lies in the hands of 3.5 million Irish people.
If Ireland rejects Nice again, 13 candidate countries will remain on the outskirts of Europe despite their cultural, social and economic links with the EU and their historical roots. The consequences of an Irish "No" - delaying enlargement in the interests of the continent's stability and security - are beyond comprehension. In a Europe and a world faced with new challenges of separatism, terrorism and the revival of social movements that brought two world wars that killed millions, the danger of non-inclusion is something Europe cannot afford.
As a citizen of one of the candidate countries currently residing in Ireland, I look with terror at the complete ignorance as to the consequences of the Irish "No", both on the part of the Government and the general public. According to a survey carried out by University College Dublin, a mere 8 per cent of the electorate "had a good understanding of what the treaty was all about" and 69 per cent of those who abstained indicated that they still did not know how they would have voted. At the same time, the "No" vote actually fell since 1998, when Ireland voted in favour of Amsterdam Treaty. The question that must be asked is not why the Irish are against the Nice treaty, but why they did not vote.
Ireland gained a political and economic boost from the European Community, which it joined 29 years ago. The country is praised internationally for its wise use of that historic opportunity, which helped bring prosperity, peace, and the return of emigrants to their homeland. Let Irish people not stand in the way of the development of half the continent. - Yours, etc.
MAGDALENA MAJKOWSKA,
Dublin 1.