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Ireland under Franco-German pressure to hold new EU vote

The Irish government is expected to bow to Franco-German pressure and hold a second referendum to try to rescue the Lisbon treaty that voters rejected this month.

The plan for a possible new vote in Ireland, being discussed by some ministers in Dublin, will be greeted with outrage by opponents of the treaty in Britain.

Irish ministers believe it may be able to rescue the treaty if they can secure concessions from Europe to placate voters on a list of issues.

“A yes vote can be achieved if the Irish people are offered guarantees on issues like defence and taxation,” said one senior Irish official. “The no campaign will be picked off one by one. Everyone has a price.”

The likely time for a new referendum is next spring so that the treaty can come into force before the June 2009 European election campaign for the Brussels parliament. The date is favoured by Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, and Angela Merkel, the German chancellor.

If the Irish vote no again, Gordon Brown would have to choose between siding with Ireland to stop its citizens being turned into second-class Europeans or siding with France and Germany to push ahead with further European Union integration.

Concessions likely to be sought by Ireland include guarantees to protect its neutrality in the event of European armed forces being created, the reinstatement of its right to a European commissioner and the right to set its own abortion laws and corporate tax rates.

Sarkozy is determined to “save” the EU as France takes over the rotating presidency on July 1.

“It is not written down in the summit conclusions but everyone agreed that we need to get out of this before next year’s European elections,” Sarkozy said last week. He said European leaders had already mandated France to ensure the EU “does not grind to a halt”.

Both Sarkozy and Merkel have exerted subtle pressure on Ireland and its potential allies by threatening the end of the EU’s enlargement east if the Lisbon treaty does not come into force.

The French president will visit Ireland on July 11 for talks with Brian Cowen, the taoiseach. “We will try to make this ‘no’ an opportunity,” he said, pledging to use “English pragmatism” to find a solution.

The Irish government has to decide its next move before the next European Council meeting on October 15.

A spring referendum date is seen as crucial by several European leaders, but no strict timeline has been imposed on Ireland to come up with a response to the no vote; and there has been no formal declaration from the European Council that the country has to hold a second referendum.

“The council did not impose a timeline or plan B or C upon us,” an Irish government official said. “That would have left us in a difficult space. Now they await our detailed analysis of where we go from here.”