Word: vaclav
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Despite the vocal misgivings of its President, Vaclav Klaus, the Czech Republic became the last of 27 European Union member states to sign the Lisbon Treaty, removing the final hurdle for its passage. The charter, intended to consolidate and strengthen the E.U.'s governance, calls for Europe's first full-time President, a new foreign policy chief and a new voting system. It could go into effect as early...
There were no trumpet blasts or jubilant ceremonies to mark the occasion. But the decision by Czech President Vaclav Klaus to sign an agreement he loathed on Tuesday was momentous, nonetheless. The long-delayed passage of the Lisbon Treaty - the Czech Republic had been the last holdout among the European Union's 27 members - marks the end of an almost decade-long saga to reform the cumbersome institution and give it a stronger, more unified voice on the global stage...
...Vaclav Houzvicka, a sociology lecturer at J. E. Purkyne University in the northern city of Usti nad Labem, says he's not surprised by the public response. Numerous surveys in recent years have shown that around two-thirds of Czechs remain wary of Germany, despite their country having entered the E.U. and NATO, he said. Moreover, the issue of the deported Germans is still emotionally charged. "The layer is so thin that it is sufficient to press one button and it is all back," he says...
...demanding in exchange for his signature will likely be determined on Oct. 29-30 when E.U. leaders gather for a summit in Brussels. But even if he fails to wrangle any concessions from the E.U., Klaus has succeeded on one front: shoring up his support among the Czech people. "Vaclav Klaus is a great pragmatist," says Jan Kubacek, a political science lecturer at Charles University in Prague. "He neither enters lost battles nor wants to lose face...
...Read "Vaclav Klaus: The Man with the E.U.'s Fate in His Hands...