Commission fears 'left-overs'

Two days before a crucial European Union summit, the executive European Commission voiced fears yesterday that squabbling leaders may adopt a weak constitution or leave core issues unresolved.

"Under no circumstances should there be any leftovers in this negotiation," chief Commission spokesman Reijo Kemppinen said after the EU executive reviewed the state of negotiations.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who will chair the talks, said he had devised a compromise that might solve a key dispute over member states' voting rights that pits heavyweights Germany and France against Spain and Poland.

"I have in my pocket a formula which I believe gives Poland and Spain recognition as great countries," Mr Berlusconi told reporters in Rome, without disclosing details.

"I will pull it out at the last minute and we will see if it will be accepted by these two countries," he said.

The new charter is designed to ensure the bloc can function smoothly after it increases from 15 to 25 states next May in an eastward expansion that will raise its population to 450 million and its economic output to about a quarter of the world's total.

EU leaders have twice failed to agree a simpler distribution of power at summits in Amsterdam in 1997 and Nice in 2000.

Diplomats said Madrid and Warsaw might be offered extra seats in the European Parliament and a second member of the Commission each in return for accepting an eventual switch to a voting system that takes more account of population size. But it was not clear such concessions would be sufficient.

Spain and Poland are clinging to the complex weighted voting system adopted in Nice which gave them almost as many votes as Germany, although it has twice their population.

The draft constitution drawn up by a Convention of lawmakers and national representatives headed by former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing proposed a "double-majority" system in which most decisions would pass if backed by a majority of member states representing 60 per cent of the population.

A senior German official said a decision must not be delayed and the new system must come into force in 2009 as planned.

France and Germany have said it would be better to have no deal than accept a watered-down constitution with a dysfunctional voting system, and have dropped veiled threats of a "hard core" of founder members moving ahead with closer integration on their own if the summit fails.

Mr Kemppinen said compromise proposals put forward by Italy so far broadly respected the balance achieved by the Convention.

But the proposed status of a planned EU foreign minister, putting him clearly under the orders of member states, and the effective reintroduction of national vetoes in key areas of justice and home affairs, were a clear step backwards, he said.

Prospects of a compromise at the crunch talks - officially scheduled to last two days but likely to drag on into Sunday - may hinge on a pre-summit meeting of the EU's big three leaders.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder will meet early tomorrow to explore possibilities of a solution.

Diplomats speculated there could be a trade-off between Franco-German acceptance of Britain's demands to keep its veto on taxation, foreign policy and the budget rebate won two decades ago by Margaret Thatcher, and a British pledge to push Spain and Poland to accept a reformed voting system.

Britain has expressed sympathy for Madrid and Warsaw and suggested postponing the voting rights issue, but officials concede it has no strong national interest either way.

"You do have to have the agreement of all 25 to move forward but, equally, it's important if some of the differences between countries as significant as these three can be ironed out in advance," Mr Blair's spokesman told reporters.