Special report by Albin Birger, Agata Byzcewska and Helmut Brüls
A HISTORIC PRESIDENCY IN A DIFFICULT POLITICAL CONTEXT
On 1 January 2009, the Czech Republic takes over the six-monthly presidency of the Council of the EU. For its first EU presidency, this “new” central European Member State with a population of ten million that joined the EU club on 1 May 2004 has chosen the slogan “Europe without Barriers”. For this young country with a very open economy, led by an extremely...