Spain has assumed the European Union's six-month rotating presidency at a defining moment for the bloc - as the new rules of the Lisbon Treaty enter into force. For the first time ever, the holder of the EU presidency has to work in parallel with the permanent President of the European Council and a High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy - two new posts created by the treaty.
EU summits will be chaired by the President of the Council but the holder of the presidency will chair most EU ministerial meetings and co-host summits with non-EU countries. The Foreign Affairs Council, the meeting of EU foreign ministers, will be chaired by the EU High Representative.
The Spanish presidency could very well set a precedent for the future institutional balance of the EU. There are bound to be teething problems, a certain amount of overlapping roles and a lack of communication between the presidency and the Council President (Herman Van Rompuy) and Foreign Policy Chief (Catherine Ashton). This is to be expected, especially since the Lisbon Treaty is somewhat vague about the role of the permanent President of the EU.
Van Rompuy's announcement of an unscheduled summit of EU leaders for next month, for example, is said to have taken the Spanish presidency by surprise, and a number of international media reports said the Spanish government was not even consulted about this meeting.
The summit, to be chaired by Von Rompuy, will discuss how to boost Europe's competitiveness and economic growth and to formulate a post-Lisbon 'EU 2020 strategy'. While there is no doubt that, in view of the economic situation, such a summit is a good initiative, one would obviously have expected some sort of co-ordination between Brussels and Madrid before such an announcement was made.
Spain's EU presidency comes at a crucial time, however, not only because it takes place under a new set of rules but, more importantly, because Europe is emerging from its worst recession in decades and the economies of some EU countries are in a very bad state.
Spain has made it clear that the presidency will focus on four main areas, namely: the recovery from the economic crisis and job creation; the successful implementation of the Lisbon Treaty; EU citizenship, with particular attention to gender equality; and helping the EU to become a genuine global player.
While all the areas are important, there is no doubt that Europe's fragile economy - particularly job creation and economic growth - should be the main focus of the presidency. In March, for example, a follow-up summit will be held to the one next month where EU leaders will try to agree on the economic strategy for the next decade.
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero certainly faces a major challenge in trying to steer Europe's fragile economy into a full recovery. His task is further complicated by the fact that Spain is still in recession and its unemployment rate is now almost at 20 per cent, so he is bound to be distracted by his domestic agenda.
Furthermore, under the Spanish presidency, EU governments will have to decide if and when to withdraw the various economic stimulus packages agreed to last year - not an easy task.
Also, it will be interesting to see how the presidency deals with the very difficult situations in countries such as Greece and Latvia whose economies are going through a very difficult phase.
Of course, Zapatero knows there is only so much the EU as a whole can achieve in certain economic policy areas. In fact, in an article in the Spanish newspaper El Pais, the Prime Minister and Von Rompuy called for more economic co-operation between member states.
"We've managed to create monetary union, and we have a single market, but we are still a long way from having configured economic union, the need for which has been brought amply into relief by the crisis," they wrote.
On the international front, Spain's interest in the Americas, North Africa and the Mediterranean is evident from the EU summits with third countries that are to be held in Spain, namely: Morocco (March 7-8); Canada (May 10); Mexico (May 15-16); Latin America and Caribbean (May 18-19); the United States (May 25); Egypt (June 5); and the Union for the Mediterranean (July 7).
Another summit, between the EU and Pakistan, is to be held on April 10, highlighting the importance the bloc attaches to this nuclear-armed Muslim country in the fight against the Taliban and Islamic extremism.
Spain will also have to keep the EU enlargement process going and one country, Croatia, is eager to conclude its accession negotiations this year, hoping for membership in 2011.
It will also have to think of a way of reviving Turkey's EU accession talks - always a difficult task - and how to deal with the EU applications of a number of other states, particularly Serbia and Iceland.