Strasbourg, 18/12/2003 (Agence Europe) - Several members of the Socialist group from the European Parliament launched an appeal on Thursday in Strasbourg "on the rebound" following the IGC summit failure in Brussels at the end of which they criticised the fact that "the adoption of the European constitution had been postponed sine die". They also point out that without a constitution or a "charter of fundamental rights…, no full employment objectives, social market economy, sustainable development…, no foreign minister to construct a common foreign policy, no European Parliament with full legislating rights, no well thought out European policies on asylum, immigration, justice, no legal base for European law preserving public services, no citizens legal initiatives, no links between European elections and the choice of a Commission president, no legal personality of the Union so that it could be represented in international organisation, no institutions made more effective to decide by majority voting". Hence "no constitution = a weaker Europe, less democratic, less social and less political", declare the signatories, noting that the responsibility for the failure lies with president of the Council Silvio Berlusconi (who began his presidency with insults and finished it clowning around" and the Polish Spanish leaders (who "did not behave like Europeans"), the French and the Germans ("who have lost all credibility" (…) by unilaterally misusing the stability pact which they wrongly imposed") and particularly president Chirac ("who is hardly the best person for explaining to the Poles and Spanish that the Treaty of Nice, which had been so badly negotiated, is not adapted to the enlargement begun ten years ago", Chirac who "is sometimes aggressive to newcomers whom he sometimes mistreats instead of trying to make allies out of them!").
Faced with this crisis, the signatories call for a wide mobilisation of all Europeans " political leaders, activists, members of organisation and associations… to save the European project". These include the president of the Socialist group Enrique Baron, the president of the constitutional committee Giorgio Napolitano and Michel Rocard from the culture committee, Pervenche Bères and Olivier Duhamel (France), former Convention Members like the Belgian Anne Van Lancker, the Italienne Elena Paciotti, Spaniared Carlos Carnero Gonzalez, the Greek Giorgios Katiforis and Myrsini Zorba also from Greece, the président of the Union of European Federalists Jo Leinen (social-democrat, Germany), and Richard Corbett, David Martin and Glyn Ford from Britain.