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The German EU presidency will end in a few weeks, and it looks like Angela Merkel will be able to bring home a rich harvest when her chancellorship is coming to an end. At least shortly before the summit of heads of state and government on Thursday, it seemed that a solution had been found in the dispute over the veto over the EU budget.
The night before, a document was presented to the EU ambassadors in Brussels which, according to Polish information, represents an “agreement between Warsaw, Budapest and Berlin”. This is a complementary conclusion to the original summit declaration, a kind of “package text”. It contains several clarifications on the effectiveness of the rule of law mechanism.
According to this, the reduction or cancellation of EU funding will not take effect until there is a ruling from the Court of Justice of the European Communities. These procedures usually take between one and a year and a half, which would give Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban a lot of time. Furthermore, the EU Commission should not take such a decision before having adopted the guidelines for its implementation. This should take several months and should be done in coordination with the member states.
Another point concerns the so-called emergency brake in the mechanism of the rule of law. In previous plans, this gave affected countries the right to address the issue at the summit of EU heads of state and government. However, it should not be possible to exercise a veto at this level. Keep it up now. However, it is clear that leading politicians “are striving to formulate a common position on this matter.”
Skepticism in Holland
Austria is one of those countries that is on a rather difficult path when it comes to the rule of law. It was heard from within EU national diplomatic circles that the proposal that has now been drawn up is, at least at first glance, quite acceptable: “Contrary to last-expressed fears, the document does not contain any changes to the original decision and certainly does not contain concrete concessions, such as that Hungary would get a special position on the migration issue, “he said from EU circles. Rather, the compromise, with which Hungary and Poland appear to be satisfied, is an “interpretative declaration” that can therefore be initiated relatively easily. It is very likely that the objections come from Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, who had clashed with his counterpart Orban at the July summit.
Discontent with Hungary and Poland increased when the two countries used the unanimity principle to veto the EU’s multi-year financial planning and the associated Corona reconstruction fund. They were not concerned with the 1.8 billion euro package, from which they themselves also benefit significantly, but with the link with the rule of law. Even the already completed annual budget for 2021 was on the brink, an emergency budget threatened with numerous negative effects.
