Sarkozy, Merkel and Zapatero criticise Tories for attempt to delay treaty
Leaders of three of the most powerful states in Europe have strongly criticised David Cameron at the EU summit over a Conservative attempt to scupper the Lisbon treaty.
Nicolas Sarkozy, Angela Merkel and José Luiz Rodríguez Zapatero are understood to have privately criticised the Tory leader after he sent a handwritten letter to the Czech president, Vaclav Klaus, who has been refusing to sign the treaty. The letter was seen as an attempt to influence the Czech Republic, which is the only country not to have ratified the treaty.
Senior British sources familiar with thinking at the highest levels of the EU say the French, German and Spanish leaders all raised questions about Cameron's letter.
It is understood that Cameron encouraged the Czech president to delay ratification of the Lisbon pact by setting out Tory policy to hold a referendum in Britain on the treaty if it had not yet been ratified by all member states.
The sources told the Guardian that:
• Sarkozy was overheard telling Gordon Brown that he was incensed by Cameron's letter, which the French saw as an attempt to wreck the Lisbon treaty.
• Merkel was also said to be upset by the Tory leader's letter. The German chancellor is understood to have echoed the concerns of senior figures in her Christian Democratic Union party, such as the former president of the EU parliament Hans Gert Poettering, that Cameron's behaviour had been untrustworthy.
• Zapatero, who addressed the Labour party's recent conference in Brighton and will have to negotiate directly with Cameron if the Tories win the general election – because Spain holds the EU's rotating presidency until July 2010 – made clear to diplomats that he regarded Cameron's letter as an attempt to scupper the treaty.
The interventions by the EU leaders come as the Tories plan to abandon their two-year campaign to hold a referendum on the Lisbon treaty if, as expected, the Czech president finally ratifies the treaty. Senior Tories told the Guardian that Cameron would set out his thinking in the coming weeks.
It is understood that Cameron will drop his pledge to hold a referendum on the treaty on the grounds that it is impossible to open a treaty that has entered EU law. A Tory government would instead focus on repatriating social and employment laws, in effect restoring the British opt-out from the social chapter. This has been sprinkled around various EU treaties since Tony Blair ended the opt-out in 1997, meaning that its measures could only be restored to Britain with the agreement of all member states.
Brown yesterday used his appearance at the summit to launch a strong attack on the Tories' approach to Europe. Speaking of the Tory decision to abandon the main centre-right EPP grouping in the European parliament in favour of a smaller group consisting mainly of fringe parties from the hard right in eastern Europe, the prime minister said: "The Conservative party are standing apart from the mainstream in Europe. They are part of a very small group of minorities – of 23 people apart from the PHP Warning: fopen(D:/HostingSpaces/vrun/rss.seo-cube.com/wwwroot/newsfeeds/cache/http___www_todayindianews_com__feed_rss2.xml) [function.fopen]: failed to open stream: Permission denied in D:\HostingSpaces\vrun\rss.seo-cube.com\wwwroot\newsfeeds\includes\zfuncs.php on line 293
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A Tory spokeswoman said: "We have never concealed the fact that we sent the letter … David Cameron has made no secret of its contents. It sets out his public opinion in a private letter."
Last night a spokesman for the Elysée palace said: "We do not comment on rumours from the corridors of the European council."
