The European Union (EU) will likely discuss the future of the Lisbon Treaty, whose ratification process had been stalled by an Irish "No" referendum, at the bloc's mid-October summit, according to a draft statement of the ongoing summit released Friday.
"The European Council agreed to Ireland's suggestion to come back to this issue at its meeting of October 15, 2008 in order to consider the way forward," said the draft document.
The EU leaders concluded their first-day talks late Thursday night and agreed not to set a deadline to solve the crisis resulting from Ireland's rejection of the Lisbon Treaty.
"It is very sure that we will not set any deadlines, not for Ireland, not for anybody else," Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency, told reporters in the early hours of Friday following the first day of an EU summit.
The two-day summit was dominated by the Irish "No" to the Lisbon Treaty in a national referendum last week, which plunged the EU into a political impasse.
The treaty, which is designed to streamline EU decision making and strengthening its external links, is expected to enter into force on Jan. 1, 2009 before elections of the European Parliament, providing that all the bloc's 27 members have ratified it.
So far, 19 EU members have approved the treaty through the parliamentary procedure. Seven countries are yet to ratify the document also through their own parliaments.
Should the ratification process be not completed as scheduled, the treaty will come into force on the first day of the month following the last ratification.
The EU leaders entered their second day talks Friday morning tofocus their discussion on the initiative for establishing a Mediterranean Union, West Balkan countries' accession to the EU, and the U.N. Millennium Development Goals.
Source: Xinhua
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