The first month of the Czech cabinet’s EU presidency has passed. But France has congratulated the Czechs in a strange way on their EU anniversary. The French daily Le Figaro published a commentary on Monday saying that during the Czech EU presidency, the European Union is “as mute as a fish”.
“President Václav Klaus’ best quality is his outspokenness. He said with disarming certainty that nothing will occur during the Czech presidency. And indeed, Europe has been mute for a month,” the French pro-government daily wrote.
The Czech score has been improved at least thanks to events on the home field: A fresh survey confirmed that Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek’s popularity in ČR has risen by 10% in January.
Sarkozy can arrange anything
The French, however, are not sparing the Czechs their feelings. “The French presidency has shown that Europe can be awake and have a dominant role when solving the most risky situations,” the daily said, adding that the Czechs are definitely not following the French track. There have been more messages like this one on the weekend from France for the Czech cabinet: Another French daily, Le Monde, wrote on Sunday that because of the crisis, Sarkozy has called for a “defiance summit” of euro zone countries on solving the global economic crisis for February.
Adequate expectations
The Czechs say that nothing like that has been firmly agreed on, but the news itself revived some fears that were accompanying the Czech presidency from the beginning: That the hyperactive French President Sarkozy will steal away the limelight from the Czechs with his verbal antics.
“We have been cooperating within the Council of Finance Ministers whose members are collaborating on finding other plans to reschedule the spring meeting. It is not a competition for who comes up with the most measures; it’s about cooperation,” Deputy Prime Minister Alexandr Vondra said.
He has got used to getting questions about Sarkozy.
“Adequate expectations,” is his answer to a question on how much Sarkozy has been trying the presiding country’s self-esteem. He points out the EU diplomatic high marks for arranging the summit with China – although this is slightly in contradiction to the long-term position of the Czech foreign policy that has been emphasizing human rights.
And although Sarkozy cannot steal away the Czech presidency, he did “steal” at least the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Abbas was to be visiting Prague on Monday, but in the end he cancelled his visit, so that he could meet with Sarkozy in the evening and solve the sensitive situation in the Gaza strip.
Conciliatory Paroubek
The Czechs have still been quite successful in their first month of EU presidency. They have mainly learnt that as the head of EU they have to choose words carefully – even though what they say may be in contradiction to the long-term Czech position.
“One month is a short time for a good evaluation. The presidency certainly has some children’s diseases, but they can still be cured,” ČSSD chairman Jiří Paroubek told HN indulgently on Monday, although normally he does not spare the feelings of “Mr Topolánek and Vondra”. In his opinion, the Czech cabinet’s reputation as the leader of the EU is still suffering: For example, the gas crisis could have been solved better had not the relations between the Czech government and Russia been so cold.
