Diplomats work to resolve treaty guarantee hitches

DIPLOMATS and legal experts were working through the night to resolve last-minute hitches in Ireland’s securing treaty status for its Lisbon guarantees.

The issue was due to be the first item on the agenda at the two-day summit that begun in Brussels yesterday evening. However, it was quickly taken off the table when it became clear that the British and a number of other countries still had issues with it.

Officials said the problem was complex because Britain was linking it to an agreement on regulation of the financial services industry.

A letter from Taoiseach Brian Cowen to the British prime minister sent on Wednesday was leaked to the media in which Mr Cowen made plain that he wanted a protocol.

“To provide the maximum possible legal reassurance to the Irish people, I need to be able to come out of our meeting and state, without fear of contradiction, that the legal guarantees contained in the decision will, in time, acquire full treaty status by way of a protocol.

“What I do require is a clear and unequivocal commitment that, at a future point after the Lisbon treaty enters into force, the legal guarantees contained in the decision will be attached to the EU treaties by way of a protocol,” the letter said.

He added that it would not require any member state to re-ratify the Lisbon treaty or any element of it, it would not be attached to the Lisbon treaty but to some future treaty.

“I want to emphasise sincerely that this is necessary if I am to call, and win, a second referendum.

“Our common goal is to secure the entry into force of the Lisbon treaty. I am asking you to give me the help I need to realise this goal,” the letter concluded.

Foreign Minister Micheál Martin said that the decision he expects the summit to make this morning will make the undertakings on abortion, neutrality and tax legally binding.

The protocol would turn this decision into primary law making doubly sure it could not be challenged.

“We are making steady progress and I am optimistic that this will be concluded satisfactorily,” he said.

The Dutch, Czechs, Poles and Slovaks were carefully watching the issue of the protocol also for their own domestic reasons.

A Dutch official said they wanted the reference to be as vague as possible since they were afraid that it could lead to a demand for a re-ratification of Lisbon in their parliament.