By Mark John
BRUSSELS, June 20 (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela
Merkel on Friday backed President Nicolas Sarkozy's call for the
European Union to forget about adding new members until it finds
a remedy to Ireland's rejection of an EU reform treaty.
Both leaders are avid backers of the so-called Lisbon Treaty
and have urged other EU members to pursue its ratification
despite Ireland's "No". They have also long made it clear that
they oppose Turkey's long-term membership aspirations.
Asked whether she agreed with Sarkozy's "No Lisbon, no
enlargement" comment on the first day of an EU summit, Merkel
said the EU's existing institutional arrangements limited the
size of the bloc to its current 27 members.
"I agree because the Nice Treaty limited the (European)
Union to a membership of 27 states and for me it is unthinkable
that we would change one area of the Nice Treaty without looking
at the whole of the Lisbon treaty," she said in Brussels.
Asked whether the 27-state ceiling also excluded Croatia,
which is at the front of the queue of those waiting to join and
hopes to conclude accession negotiations next year, she replied
simply: "Croatia is indeed a country."
Turkey and Croatia are currently negotiating their accession
to the EU, with several other countries in the Western Balkans
working their way up the candidacy ladder.
But countries such as Austria and some of the ex-communist
states that have joined the bloc since the end of the Cold War
disagreed with Paris and Berlin.
"The Irish vote should in no way be related to the
enlargement," said Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said.
"Enlargement is definitely not impossible without the Lisbon
Treaty. Some leaders state this as condition but we don't see it
that way," he said.
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Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik urged that Croatia
"should not become the first victim of the Irish referendum".
"We have to keep our word, it would be a wrong signal to the
Balkan states to put a question mark over enlargement," she
said, adding that the final summit declaration had also given
encouragement to the entry hopes of countries in the region.
Plassnik noted that negotiations with Croatia and Turkey and
been opened at the height of EU uncertainty following the 2005
French and Dutch rejections of the defunct EU constitution which
the Lisbon Treaty was meant to replace.
The Lisbon Treaty was agreed last year by leaders after
years of wrangling over how to make the EU more manageable but
needs approval by all member states to come into effect.
"I would find it very strange for a Europe of 27 (countries)
that has trouble agreeing on workable institutions to agree on
adding a 28th, a 29th, a 30th, a 31st, which would definitely
make things worse," Sarkozy said on Thursday.
EU leaders hope by October to have some gameplan for getting
out of the impasse created by the Irish rejection. But they
acknowledged at the summit that another member state, the Czech
Republic, had to run the text through its constitutional court
before it could ratify it.
Separately, EU leaders backed plans on Friday to offer
closer ties to the bloc's eastern neighbours, partly to match a
more ambitious project for the Mediterranean region.
The Eastern Partnership plan is to offer new areas of
cooperation to Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan
and, subject to domestic reforms, Belarus.
While the plan is vague, some EU capitals see it as
preparing some of the participating countries for entry.
(Reporting by Mark John, editing by Paul Taylor)
