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Lech Kaczynski, Poland’s president, has signed the Lisbon treaty, leaving the Czech Republic the only country yet to ratify the controversial European Union reform plan. Flanked by José Manuel Barroso, the head of the European commission, and the Polish president of the European parliament, Jerzy Buzek, Mr Kaczynski put his signature to the treaty in Warsaw. “The fact that the Irish people changed their minds meant the revival of the treaty, and there are no longer any obstacles to its ratification,” said Mr Kaczynski in a short speech, adding that it was a “historic” day for both Poland and the...

Vaclav Klaus, the anti-EU president of the Czech Republic, today moved to re–open the union's ill-starred Lisbon treaty, stirring exasperation in Brussels, Berlin, and Paris by demanding that Prague be granted exemptions from parts of the reform blueprint. snip . . . Member states and Brussels are desperate to get the treaty in place before the UK election next year, to lessen the chances of a referendum on the document in Britain. The Conservative party leader, David Cameron, has pledged to stage a referendum if he takes office with the treaty not fully ratified.

The facts outlined below will prove that the Lisbon Treaty Referendum of 2/10/09 is Null and Void under Irish and European law. I present two separate points that shall subsequently be proven: I. Numerous violations of Irish Referendum law and discrepancies that call into question the security and validity of the votes themselves, default the Irish vote to the result of the last Referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. II. The Irish Government, alongside the European Commission ran a fraudulent and illegal campaign for the Lisbon Treaty Referendum. If everybody reading this downloaded the printable version and filed it with the...

WARSAW (Reuters) - Polish President Lech Kaczynski will sign the European Union's Lisbon Treaty into law on Sunday October 11, a presidential aide said on Thursday. Poland and the Czech Republic are the only countries in the 27-member EU still to ratify the treaty after Irish voters overwhelmingly backed the document in a referendum last Friday. The treaty aims to streamline EU decision-making. It has to be ratified by all 27 member states to come into force. "The president keeps his word. He said he will sign the treaty with no delays if the Irish say 'yes'. On Sunday he...

Ireland voted strongly in favour of the European Union's Lisbon Treaty, overturning a stunning No vote and taking a key step towards ending the 27-nation bloc's deadlock, ministers said Saturday. Europe Minister Dick Roche told AFP he expected "overwhelming" backing for the treaty in a second referendum, called after a June 2008 No vote, while Foreign Affairs Minister Micheal Martin predicted a "convincing win." The No camp conceded defeat even before official results were published, after informal exit polls pointed to a 60 per cent vote in favour of the treaty -- designed to streamline decision-making in the expanding European...

The Irish Yes to the Lisbon Treaty has been greeted with whoops of joy by the European establishment from Cork to Cracow. But the long battle over Lisbon is not over. The spotlight now falls on the Czech Republic and its President, Vaclav Klaus. EU elites may have successfully defeated democracy for the fifth time – they overrode the Danish No to Maastricht in 1992, the Irish No to Nice in 2001, and the Dutch and French Nos to the European Constitution (the forerunner of Lisbon) in 2005. But the Lisbon Treaty still remains unratified in two Central European states...

Irish PM formally declares victory for yes side in European Union Lisbon treaty referendum.

A political row over the Irish government’s failure to force the former chairman of a state-owned bank to meet his debt obligations is threatening to undermine support for the European Union’s Lisbon Treaty on the eve of a crucial referendum. Although the most recent polls, released last weekend, gave the Yes vote a comfortable lead, a senior Labour party official said on Thursday that recent financial scandals could persuade a large proportion of undecided voters to vote No. “It is a worrying trend that has been continuing for the best part of the week,” said Joe Costello, the party’s European...

The Mad Hatter told Alice that "words mean what you want them to mean." He would have been at home in the European Union, where "no" means "yes" and political propaganda is passed off as information. If Ireland votes No to the Lisbon Treaty, the EU will continue and Ireland will be part of it, but if they vote Yes the Irish will find they have even less leverage in Europe than today. In the course of the second referendum campaign in Ireland some extraordinary claims have been made about the economic consequences of voting No: it would frighten investors,...

EU leaders are said to be furious that the Czech Republic is planning to delay signing the Lisbon treaty for up to six months even if the Irish vote "yes" in their referendum next month. The country might even try to delay it until after the British general election campaign when a Tory victory would see the question put to voters by David Cameron. Nicolas Sarkozy, who helped to draw up the treaty after the French and Dutch voted against its predecessor, the EU Constitution, has warned Prague that it faces "consequences" if it does not swiftly follow an Irish...

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - French President Nicolas Sarkozy has warned the Czech Republic that it will have to face "consequences" if it continues to delay final ratification of the Lisbon Treaty following a Yes vote in a referendum in Ireland next month. Speaking after a meeting of EU leaders in Brussels on Thursday (17 September), Mr Sarkozy was careful to praise Czech Prime Minister Jan Fischer as a "man of great quality" before taking a clear sideswipe at the country's president, Vaclav Klaus, who has indicated he will postpone as long as possible putting his signature under the treaty -...

Nicolas Sarkozy has been accused of making a power grab to install himself as president of the European Union, a post that no longer exists after the Irish rejected the Lisbon Treaty in June. The French president, who holds the EU's rotating six month presidency until the end of December, has dominated the international stage following the Russian invasion of Georgia in August and the global financial crisis in recent weeks. But he has dismayed Brussels diplomats and angered the Czech Republic, which takes over the EU presidency in January, by suggesting that countries belonging to the euro, with an...

Ireland rejected the European Lisbon treaty comprehensively in a referendum this year. Now Irish and European politicians and are gearing up for another referendum or simply go over the voters heads and legislate this unreadable document into existence.

The words were clear: "Europe has powerful enemies on the other side of the Atlantic, gifted with considerable financial means." The speaker was France's Europe Minister Jean-Pierre Jouyet, addressing a pro-European rally in Lyon at the weekend. He was putting the blame for the Irish rejection of the Lisbon Treaty on some surprising shoulders: neoconservatives in the United States. "The role of the American neocons was very important in the victory of the 'no,'" he said. ... One of the most powerful groups campaigning against the treaty was Libertas... There has been much speculation about where exactly the Libertas funding...

Britain has become the 19th European Union country to ratify the Lisbon Treaty without a referendum, after the EU Amendment Bill completed its passage through Parliament. A last-ditch Conservative attempt to delay ratification until the autumn was voted down in the House of Lords by a margin of 93, and peers later gave the Bill its third reading without a vote. Eurosceptic members of the European Parliament display posters calling on the EU to respect the outcome of Ireland's recent vote Royal Assent is expected to follow within 24 hours. Parliamentary ratification came on the eve of an EU summit...

Last week's summit in Brussels failed to resolve the EU crisis caused by the Irish "no" to the Lisbon Treaty. But Europe's politicians are determined to avoid asking the people their opinion. And they are right to do so. REUTERS Would you buy a used treaty from these people? This must be the biggest collection of scoundrels in the world. There are 27 of them. No, more: It's not just the heads of state and government who are here, but also the foreign ministers. Sitting there at their enormous table, they seem to be chatting amiably, but it's far less...

It is time to accept that the Lisbon treaty is dead. The European Union can get along well enough without it VOTERS have once again shot an arrow into the heart of a European Union treaty. This time it was the Irish, who voted no to the Lisbon treaty on June 12th by 53-47%, on a high turnout. They follow the French and Dutch, who rejected Lisbon's predecessor, the EU constitution, in 2005. In 2001 the Irish also turned down the Nice treaty, but the Danes started this game when they voted against the Maastricht treaty in 1992. Europe's political...

Czech threat looms for EU treaty The Czech PM said he would not bet much on a Czech 'Yes' EU leaders have admitted that the Czech Republic may not be able to ratify the Lisbon Treaty, which has already been rejected by the Irish. The declaration from their summit in Brussels notes that the Czech process is on hold due to legal difficulties. But they said ratification would continue elsewhere, and ruled out renegotiation of the treaty. But British PM Gordon Brown said the UK could not definitively ratify it until a court ruled on a legal challenge. It...

STRASBOURG, France, JUNE 18, 2008 (Zenit.org).- As European Union member states consider the quandary created by Ireland's "no" vote to the Lisbon Treaty, the Holy See's representative at the Council of Europe says it's a sign that Europe needs to rediscover its roots. Monsignor Aldo Giordano, named earlier this month as the permanent observer of the Holy See to the Council of Europe, spoke Sunday with Vatican Radio about Ireland's June 12 referendum that put the Treaty of Lisbon in limbo. The treaty needs unanimous approval from the Union's 27 member states for it to go into effect. The prelate...

DUBLIN (Reuters) - Irish voters rejected a treaty on Friday to overhaul the European Union's unwieldy institutions, putting the entire bloc's reform plan in peril and humiliating Ireland's political leaders. The pact, known as the Lisbon treaty, failed by a margin of 53.4 to 46.6 percent in the only EU country to put it to a popular vote. "No" vote supporters cheered loudly for several minutes, interrupting an official as he read out the results. Prime Minister Brian Cowen called the vote "a source of disappointment to my colleagues in government and to me." "In a democracy, the will of...