Dublin / Strasbourg, 03/09/2002 (Agence Europe) - The Irish Government has just launched a national information campaign on the implications of the Treaty of Nice, just a few weeks from the referendum on the project to reform the European institutions and the EU's "Open Sesame" enlargement plan that had been rejected by a majority of the Irish people last year. A 14-page brochure giving details of the changes that ratification of the Treaty by the fifteen EU Member States would bring is to be distributed over coming weeks to 1.4 million homes in Ireland.
CSU member Ingo Friedrich raised a cry of alarm in Strasbourg saying: "If the Irish were to reject the Treaty of Nice at their second referendum also, we would not have a decisive legal base for enlargement to the East. Recent polls in Ireland make one fear that the Treaty may fall yet again with this new version of the referendum, on 18 October".
European Parliament Plenary Session