EU Trade Commissionmer: 'no' vote may cause chaos

[RonOnGuitar]

More news that will likely upset our Galmin, heh....

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Constitution 'no' vote may cause chaos: EU trade commissioner



A 'no' vote against the European constitution could cause chaos, EU Trade Commissionmer Peter Mandelson warned here on Friday.

"Financial markets don't like uncertainty. A 'no' could have damaging consequences," said Mandelson at a press conference at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport ahead of a meeting with business and political groups backing the 'yes' vote.

The Netherlands holds a referendum on the adoption of the proposed constitution June 1, while the French are also due to vote on it May 29. Opinion polls indicate that in France the constitution will be rejected.

"In case of a 'no', at best Europe will stagnate, at worst it will be chaos," added Mandelson, the former British cabinet minister who now holds one of the EU's most powerful jobs.

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And today the UK Guardian reports:



French opposition to EU constitution hits new high



Jon Henley in Paris

Saturday April 23, 2005

The Guardian



French voters' opposition to the EU constitution rose to a record high yesterday, amid mounting concern in Brussels that an apparently inevitable French non will torpedo the treaty before it is launched.

"It is very clear that the European commission is worried by the turn the statistics are taking," an EU spokeswoman, Françoise Le Bail, told reporters in Brussels. "We very much hope that these figures will change."



A poll for the free newspaper Metro by MarketTools research group yesterday showed 62% of people who have decided how to vote will reject the treaty in France's May 29 referendum, four points up from the previous 58% high in a survey by the BVA agency released on Thursday.

European leaders and EU officials also expressed their concern at the consequences of a French no vote, because the constitution needs to be ratified by all 25 member states to come into force.



Luxembourg's prime minister, Jean-Claude Juncker, whose country holds the EU presidency until the end of June, said Europe would continue to develop if France voted no to the constitution.



"But we would lose two decades, during which certain parts of the world would move ahead by adopting Europe's model, while others would catch up with us," Mr Juncker told the French Roman Catholic newspaper La Croix. It was unrealistic to think, as some of the treaty's opponents suggest, that the constitution could be renegotiated, he added.



In Amsterdam, the EU trade commissioner, Peter Mandelson, said that if France voted no, "Europe will not fall apart. At best it would stagnate. At worst, we would see some form of chaos".



Yesterday's French poll showed that the no vote, which last September was down at 31%, has now gained more than 10 points in barely four weeks since it first nudged into the lead on March 18 - a momentum that many commentators and analysts are describing as unstoppable.



The MarketTools poll contrasts with one by the CSA group on Thursday that showed that support for a yes vote, while still below 50%, had jumped by four points over the past fortnight. But there can be little doubt about the overall trend: 22 successive polls have suggested French voters will reject the constitution.



The latest poll also represents a major setback to President Jacques Chirac, whose first, widely-derided foray into the campaign in a TV debate with young people last week has apparently failed to halt the advance of the no camp.



For a majority of French voters, the referendum presents a risk-free opportunity to punish the government for a string of deeply unpopular social and economic reforms. Many in France are also firmly convinced that the constitution enshrines a market-dominated vision of Europe which they do not share.

[Galmin]

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More news that will likely upset our Galmin, heh....

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It doesn't. The reason for that is that you haven't blessed it with a "headline" or "short analysis" or "piece of text" of utter baloney in a feeble attempt to try to push the article into something it definitely isn't...this time. Congratulations. Pure oversight, I'd imagine?

Edited by: Galmin  at: 4/25/05 0:03