 Britain ratifies Lisbon Treaty
(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-06-20 07:45
Britain has become the 19th country to ratify the EU Lisbon Treaty after upper house of Parliament rejected a last-minute attempt to delay it. The House of Lords has voted against a motion put forward by the opposition Conservative Party to delay ratification of the European Union treaty until October. The motion in the Lords on Wednesday was defeated in a vote of 277 to 184. The treaty is aimed at streamlining the bloc and requires approval by all 27 member nations to go into effect. Irish voters rejected the treaty in a referendum last week and Britain's Conservatives had argued that ratification should be delayed to give Ireland a chance to decide how to proceed. The head of the European Commission on Wednesday urged EU countries to act quickly to resolve a political crisis caused by Ireland's rejection of the bloc's reform treaty. Jose Manuel Barroso told the European Parliament that governments need time to regroup "but equally we should not take too long." He urged the eight countries that have not yet ratified the Lisbon Treaty to do so. Speaking a day before leaders of the EU's 27 countries were to meet at a summit in Brussels to discuss the Irish "no" vote, Barroso said the EU must work closely with the Irish government to find a way out of the impasse. The treaty, replacing a proposed EU constitution that Dutch and French voters rejected in 2005, seeks to reform EU powers and institutions in line with a rapid expansion of the bloc eastward in recent years, but the Irish rejection dealt it a major blow. Agencies (China Daily 06/20/2008 page12) |
