-Caveat Lector-
The Guardian (London) Saturday June 16, 2001
Ian Black and Michael White in Gothenburg
EU leaders fear wrath of the people
Europe's leaders were last night forced to consider slowing down their
"great debate" about the future of the continent in the face of growing
evidence of "a widespread sense of disconnection" between the EU and its
citizens.
As hundreds of anti globalisation rioters offered tangible proof of
alienation in violent clashes on the streets of Gothenburg, the 15 heads
of government attending the Swedish summit were warned that ordinary
people remain frustrated by their remoteness and lack of democratic
accountability.
Anarchist riots forced them to cancel a planned dinner at a restaurant in
the city centre and stay instead in the heavily guarded conference centre.
Britain's low election turnout has deeply unsettled ministers. But the
catalyst for yesterday's agonising was an unusually outspoken public
intervention by Bertie Ahern, the Irish prime minister.
Mr Ahern told colleagues that Ireland's shock rejection of the Nice
treaty, which paves the way for EU expansion up to 27 members, underlined
a "widespread sense of disconnection" between the union and its people.
"There is frustration at what is seen as an absence of clarity, openness
and responsiveness in how the union goes about his business," he added.
"There is a real and urgent need to focus on how we make the union more
meaningful to our citizens and on how its democratic accountability can be
strengthened."
The Irish No is unlikely to kill the treaty or prevent enlargement of the
EU to the south and east by 2004. Mr Ahern will seek a Yes vote in another
referendum, but not until next year.
But anxiety with the 54% to 46% voter rejection of Nice in Ireland was
barely concealed by some summiteers.
And it prompted Tony Blair and fellow leaders to admit to second thoughts
as to whether the time is right to launch a potentially divisive debate
about the future constitutional direction of Europe.
Outside the summit venue hundreds of anti-capitalist activists clashed
with police, throwing sticks and cobble stones and erecting burning
barricades. Protesters, many wearing black hoods, smashed several shop
front windows, including two McDonald's hamburger restaurants.
Mr Blair denounced the violence in which up to 37 people, including 10
police officers, were injured. "The protests are a complete outrage. To
result in this violence is not just entirely wrong, but also completely
misguided."
The Belgians, who take over the EU presidency from Sweden next month, are
due to launch the debate over the future shape of Europe.
"The EU should not proceed too fast," said the Austrian chancellor,
Wolfgang Schussel, who has experienced voter alienation in the shape of
Joerg Heider's far-right Freedom party. "Nice has not yet been ratified
and we are already talking about new goals."
But the gloom looked set to kill off Swedish hopes of speeding up the
process.
Goran Persson, the Swedish prime minister and summit host, had hoped to
issue a more precise target date for the entry of countries such as Poland
and Hungary, which lead the 12 applicants queueing up to join the club.
EU leaders repeated that the bitterly contested Nice treaty, which
includes a long-overdue overhaul of creaking institutional machinery,
cannot be renegotiated and that enlargement - the biggest ever undertaken
- must go ahead.
The first newcomers are expected in 2004. Ireland is the only EU state
which requires a popular vote, but all 15 members have to ratify it for it
to become law.
Spain's conservative prime minister, Jose-Maria Aznar, made the same
argument in favour of a new slowly-slowly approach.
Mr Blair is also likely to welcome this since he fears the divisive
abstractions of constitutional debate as he contemplates Britain's crucial
decision on a euro referendum.
Gerhard Schroder, the German chancellor and his foreign minister, Joschka
Fischer, last year sparked a wide debate about the future of Europe as it
enlarges in advance of new treaty talks in 2004.
But Mr Schroder appeared to be backing down in the aftermath of the Irish
vote, which some now fear could come to prove as difficult as the Danish
rejection of the Maastricht treaty in 1992.
"The debate about the final shape of Europe must not be conducted under
time pressure," he said, acknowledging Dublin's point that was important
to involve the wider public in planning the EU's future.
"Its an extremely important debate," Mr Persson said. "We have to move
closer to our electorates."
Mr Ahern is likely to negotiate an opt-out on parts of the treaty that
Irish voters dislike - notably provisions for setting up an EU rapid
reaction force which opponents of Nice claimed would breach Ireland's
treasured neutrality.
Ireland's rejection of the treaty came just as negotiations with the
candidate countries - Estonia, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland,
Slovenia, Cyprus, Malta, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Latvia and Lithuania
- were making good progress after an ugly row with Spain over future
regional funding.
Leaders of the 12 candidates are joining EU leaders for the last day of
the summit today.
==================
6/15/01
The Irish people have spoken. But their elites are elites and don't
really represent the people who elected them. They have plans for
the masses which are too stupid to know what is good for them. It is
for this very reason that so few referenda have been made available
to the people of Europe ( and NONE to the citizens of the US,) to
decide upon. Every time they felt forced to
do so, they either lost, or won by a razor thin margin.
Let us see how they try to get around the will of the people.
Nurev.
=========================================================================
The Irish Times
Friday, June 15, 2001
"As far as PANA [Peace And Neutrality Alliance] is
concerned, the new EU should be one without any
military dimension."
Treaty of Nice is dead, long live Connolly's vision
By Roger Cole
The Irish people have spoken. The Treaty of Nice is
dead. If the Irish political elite attempt to subvert
the will of the Irish people expressed through a
secret ballot, there will be a successful legal challenge
to prevent them from doing so.
The rest of the political elite in the European Union
also have no right to subvert the sovereign will of
the Irish people. Unless all the member-states, all of
which are legal equals, accept the treaty it
automatically falls.
Their contempt for the Irish people clearly showed in
their reaction to our vote against the treaty.
It showed on the face of the Swedish Minister for
Foreign Affairs, who seemed to express a virtually
racist sense of superiority in her rejection of our
decision. Every Irish person knows that she and the
rest of the elite did not place the treaty for
ratification ***** before their own people.***** ( accents added - Nurev )
The Peace And Neutrality Alliance (PANA) has friends
and contacts in Sweden who assure us that, had there
been a referendum on the Nice Treaty in that country,
it would have been defeated. PANA would not have been
surprised that, if there had been referendums in all
the other states, many would have voted No.
In fact the entire project of the EU elite is to
transform the EU from a Common Market which Ireland
joined in the 1970s, without virtually any reference
to the various peoples of the EU, into a super-state,
a "world power" as the President of the European
Commission, Romano Prodi, put it. They show, by
refusing to have referendums in their own states, that
their contempt is not restricted to the Irish people
but extends to their own.
It is certain that a cheer of support for the Irish
people was heard among the ordinary people in all the
member-states. Even the people of the applicant states
must welcome our decision.
If the European elite can treat the people of Ireland,
a small democratic state, with such arrogance,
applicant state populations can rest assured that they
will suffer the same imperial attitude when they join
the EU.
And join they should. The Peace And Neutrality
Alliance wrote to the ambassadors of all the applicant
states at the start of the Nice Treaty referendum
campaign informing them that, providing the process of
entry was done in a democratic manner, PANA had not
only no problem with those countries joining, but
would positively welcome them.
So, what kind of phoenix can rise from the ashes of
the Treaty of Nice? As far as PANA is concerned, the
new EU should be one without any military dimension.
The new treaty to replace the dead one would have to
contain - as an absolute minimum - a protocol, similar
to that which the Danes already have, which would
exclude Ireland from paying for, or involvement with,
the European Rapid Reaction Force.
If the new treaty included such a protocol then, as
chairman of PANA, I will recommend to the executive
that we would not campaign against the new treaty.
PANA campaigned against Nice purely on opposition to
Irish involvement with the militarisation of the EU
through the RRF, so there is a reasonable possibility
the recommendation would be accepted.
However, there is a large number of groups affiliated
to PANA which have a wider agenda, including the
National Platform, the Green Party and Sinn Féin.
These and other groups would clearly seek further
changes.
It is clear that many people who voted No did not
agree with Ireland losing its commissioner. They voted
No because they did not agree with "enhanced
co-operation". They did not agree with the gradual
abolition of our veto. Thus the Government has to take
into consideration objections to the treaty other than
those raised by PANA.
The vote was not a flash in the pan. The number of
people voting against the efforts to transform a
Common Market into a European super-state, a European
empire, has been increasing steadily in successive
referendums.
We need to defend our independence. Our national
independence was fought for by generations of
political leaders who did not take brown paper
envelopes. We owe it to them to continue to defend our
democracy.
Finally, on a personal note, as a member of the Labour
Party for many years, as we come up to the 90th
anniversary of the foundation of the party by James
Connolly, I deeply resent hearing my party president
stating that Connolly is "irrelevant".
A party that forgets its history, is forgotten by
history. I want to see a Labour-led government. A
Labour-led government that will spend money on health,
education, public transport and other social services,
rather that give it to international arms dealers.
A Labour-led government still inspired by the slogan:
Neither King nor Kaiser, but Ireland.
Roger Cole is chairman of PANA
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
This is a fine example of why this top loaded elite run
globalization will fail. They can only fool all of the
people of the world some of the time. The rest of the time
we see the awful results of globalization on the majority
of people it affects.
There is a real possibility that the EU will be born dead.
Nurev
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