Iraq Division to Cast Shadow on European Unity Summit

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, April 16, 2003

Iraq Division to Cast Shadow on European Unity Summit

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Leaders from the European Union (EU) and candidate countries, joined by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, will meet in Athens on late Wednesday in a show of continental unity despite severe splits over Iraq.

On the first day of the two-day summit, heads of all EU 15 members will watch 10 central and eastern European nations sign accession treaties to join the bloc in 2004 at a ceremony at the foot of Athens' famed Acropolis, where the western civilization was born.

The meeting was originally planned as a simple signing ceremony and few of the present 15 EU leaders had been expected to attend. But the war in Iraq changed the agenda, said a Greek official.

It will now include all EU leaders, including British Prime Minister Tony Blair, whose forces are fighting alongside US troops in Iraq, and French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder -- two of the most prominent figures against the war.

"This is a big day for Europe and a big day for Greece," said Greek Prime Minister Costas Simitis, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the EU and has battled to unify EU states.

The 10 countries due to join the EU next year are Poland, Cyprus, Hungary, Latvia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Lithuania, Estonia, Slovenia and Malta.

The European community has expanded four times since six core nations -- Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands -- agreed to place their coal and steel production under a single, supranational authority in 1951.

Until now, the expansion has been an incremental affair. In previous enlargements of 1973, 1981, 1986 and 1995, the union took in just three, one, two and three new members, respectively.

But the enlargement will not stop in 2004. Turkey will join Romania and Bulgaria at the meeting as they are next in a queue to join the EU after the 10.

Under the present plans, EU leaders will also meet Moldova, Ukraine, Belarus and countries of the Mediterranean region with which the bloc has signed a cooperation agreement.

"This is a European conference to discuss issues of common interest between the European Union and these countries," said the Greek prime minister.

Most analysts believe the summit would be a "kiss-and-makeup" meeting, but other commentators fear it could be a rerun of European divisions over Iraq, especially at a time when the international community split again on the reconstruction of postwar Iraq.

The Bush administration has said the United States and its partners will be in charge in Iraq and described the UN role as largely humanitarian and advisory rather than central to establishing a new government.

UN chief Annan, who canceled his trip to Russia, hopes to learn at first hand what role Europe wants the United Nations to play in Iraq.

Many analysts doubted, however, the EU leaders would be able to find a common position on this hot issue.

Only days before the EU summit, Russian President Vladimir Putin held a "peace camp" summit on Iraq in St. Petersburg with his counterparts from France and Germany, stressing a central role for the United Nations in the reconstruction of postwar Iraq.

Chirac, the most vocal critic of the war prior to the start of the US-led war on Iraq, noted the Iraq crisis had left both transatlantic and inter-European relations badly bruised.

"In the Iraqi crisis, the international community is divided. Our differences concerned the way the world was to be managed," said Chirac.

The summit had been planned as part of an annual Russo-German encounter, to which Putin invited Chirac last week.

Though Blair, Washington's chief ally, has called for a substantial UN political role in postwar Iraq, reportedly turned down a similar invitation.

"You cannot say it is an ominous warning," said a veteran diplomat. "But it shows the division would still exist even after EU leaders try to grab this chance to show a new unity among them."

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