Arriving late...

So Vaclav Klaus has recently discovered that he needs opt-outs from the Lisbon treaty. This is interesting... He has had 2 years to think about it, to read it and to disagree with it. As this article points out, he has delayed signing the treaty, which has already been ratified by his country's legislature, claiming:

1st- that he would wait until Ireland voted on it in a second referendum

2nd- that his approval was contingent on his nation's supreme court agreeing that the treaty is not unconstitutional (once the Irish approved the treaty)

3rd - on October 8th (yesterday) Klaus asked for the addition

4th - that he would need "an opt out to prevent the heirs of the millions of ethnic Germans expelled after the second world war from filing land claims to regain their confiscated property" (quoted from the previously mentioned article, not from the original presidential communication)

Ignoring for a second the fact that the Czech president is demanding an inexucasable (though apparently by no means irrefusable...) violation of the rights of Germans, which through discrimination violates any principles of equality of Germans and Czechs before the law, he is not actually asking for an opt out, at least not specifically. Unless there is a specific article in the Lisbon treaty addressing this issue, there is no need for opt outs. I don't know where EU law stands on this issue, and I am not even sure that there is any form of legislation or jurisprudence on it. But ignoring this...

It is becoming obvious that Mr Klaus is wasting time. He is doing his best to postpone his country's approval of the Lisbon Treaty. His behaviour over the last two days is starting to reinforce my belief that he is indeed doing his best to hold the Nice Treaty ship until Cameron comes on board and aborts the Lisbon treaty altogether.

If this is true the Lisbon treaty is actually in a bit of a pickle... In order to convince Klaus to put his name on it, the EU has no sticks or carrots, or at least none that are efficient. Truth be told no one has carrots tasty enough for Klaus. However it may be possible to engage his supporters so that the legislation may be approved by a majority of the parliament, sufficient to over ride his veto. Whether a transition, bureaucratic PM is able to do that is still to be proven, but I doubt that this is something which can be helped at any other level but the domestic one. Assuming that they need a 2/3 majority to over ride Klaus, this government is going to need to convince 7 new MPs (without loosing any of the ones which supported it so as to gain a total of no less than 132 votes) and not lose any more than two votes in the Senate, where it would need a 52 vote majority. (check the number of votes in the house of representatives and in the senate, and the distribution of seats between parties in the house of representatives and in the senate, last table grand total. ).

This lateness may be an advantage to Klaus in delaying this process and gaining time until Cameron arrives, but it is not to the Lisbon treaty advantage. Let's hope those votes won't arrive late too.