EU leaders await word on Lisbon Treaty at summit

EU leaders are hoping for good news from Prague on the Lisbon Treaty at their summit this evening, but are facing a furious Poland threatening to scupper a deal on global warming over how much they should pay to help developing countries cope with climate change.

All eyes will be on the Czech Prime Minister Jan Fischer tonight when he attends the two-day meeting in Brussels. Member states are hoping that he and the Swedish presidency will be able to confirm that they have reached agreement with Czech President Vaclav Klaus on the Czech opt-out from the Charter of Fundamental Rights. This will mean there is just one more hurdle before the Lisbon Treaty can finally be adopted — a ruling from the Czech Constitutional Court expected next Tuesday.

However, diplomats were warning yesterday that EU leaders are unlikely to agree to the wording of the Czech opt-out without a guarantee that the wily Klaus will sign the treaty once cleared by the court. The court is widely expected to do so as it has already ruled the treaty does not contravene the Czech Constitution but it is now considering fresh objections from a number of senators and from Klaus.

The most high-profile topic — who could be the EU president — will not be officially on the agenda but the leaders are expected to discuss it over dinner.

In this informal context they are also likely to touch on the job of foreign minister.

The leaders face a major battle over their efforts to agree their position for the Copenhagen Climate Conference in early December. Money is the sticking point and the Poles and eight other new member states appear to have the others over a barrel.

The EU is to agree how much money will be contributed towards helping developing and poor countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The thorny issue is how to decide what amount of money each country should contribute.

The Poles want their payments based on the amount of money countries spend on overseas development aid. They have made it quite clear that they are ready to veto any agreement on Copenhagen if they do not get their way and have created major upset by reneging on agreements they came to in earlier negotiations on the issue.

They are using this as leverage for another issue they and their supporters are concerned about — €€75 billion worth of greenhouse gas permit allowances, known as “hot air”, they could sell to other countries that have exceeded their CO2 limits.