Daggers drawn as EU talks at stalemate

Last updated at 08:29 18 June 2004


The search for a European constitution - and a new commission president - continues today in a mood of bitterness and recrimination at the EU summit in Brussels.

The first day of constitution talks erupted in an Anglo-French row over concessions to Britain.

And the mood only worsened during last night's five-hour search over dinner for someone to replace Romano Prodi.

Tony Blair and President Jacques Chirac were said to be at daggers drawn, and the atmosphere spread to the others - just when they were supposed to be demonstrating post euro-election harmony and solidarity.

It is now up to Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern, chairing the summit, to rescue the crucial talks and calm the cross-channel tensions.

In the early hours he said: "We have had one long

day. Now we face another."

Trade-off

Mr Ahern acted as referee as tensions worsened between Mr Blair and Mr Chirac over the constitution. Then the summiteers moved on to dinner where no-one came close to a consensus on who should take over the top commission job when Mr Prodi stands down in October.

Now the summit faces what Mr Ahern has worked hard to avoid - a political trade-off between the commission president and a constitution compromise.

The stage was set for trouble when Mr Chirac

bitterly blamed Mr Blair yesterday for watering down the new constitution.

The Frenchman was furious that the draft deal

gave Mr Blair almost everything he wanted on his "red line" demands to keep the British veto on tax issues, defence, social security and the EU budget.

Petulantly, he then dismissed the idea of a Briton - Chris Patten - as commission president - because Britain, he said, did not participate in all EU policies.

Mr Blair kept his cool - but one British official

said: "These are choppy waters.

"They are trying to test our position. If they want to object they can take the rap for pulling it all down, not us."

No consensus

At dinner the mood was worse. With France vehemently opposing Chris Patten, and Mr Blair vehemently opposing Belgian prime minister Guy Verhofstadt - Mr Chirac's choice for the commission job - it was a complete stand-off.

President Chirac was smouldering; Mr Blair was simmering - and none of the other candidates for the commission job - eight or nine names in all were mentioned at dinner - came close to winning a consensus and breaking the tension.

In the early hours, Mr Ahern was still acting as honest broker but called it a night.

He told a press conference: "We need a strong consensus and we are not yet in that position. We have a range of good quality candidates and we will come back to this on Friday afternoon or Friday evening."

On the constitution, the summit host declared: "I am not over-optimistic about getting a deal overall. There are still some difficult issues."

The most difficult, it seemed being the dark mood between the French president and the British prime minister.

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