THE EUROPEAN Union needed to find a "common solution" to the situation arising from Ireland's rejection of the Lisbon Treaty, Finland's foreign minister Alexander Stubb told the Lisbon subcommittee at Leinster House yesterday.
He said he was opposed to any attempt at threatening Ireland with exclusion from a "core Europe" because, as with nuclear weapons, "you can threaten with it, but never use it".
"Ireland is one of the most constructive and progressive member states we have," Dr Stubb added.
On the right to have one commissioner per member state, the Nice Treaty was in operation at present and sought to place a restriction on this right, but if Lisbon were ratified there would be "a door open for that interpretation".
On the issue of renegotiating the Lisbon Treaty, he said it was a "very, very difficult" option. Any time institutional questions and powers were discussed, "it usually ends up in an unfortunate bloodbath".
Recalling the "traumatic" negotiations at Nice, he said: "I don't think you end up with a better solution. At the end of the day, to go back and reopen the whole package is a little bit unrealistic." The EU was in "a constant mode of treaty-changing" for the past 25 years.
"In this process there have always been problems and at the end of the day they have always been solved." Although he had written his PhD thesis on "flexible integration", he commented in relation to Lisbon: "There are no flexible solutions to this one, it's going to be a common European solution."
Like Ireland, Finland was a geographically-peripheral country located beside a "big neighbour" and was not involved in any military alliances. "In many ways I think our experience is the same."
"It is in the interests of small states to have strong institutions," he added. "You have to be around the table where the decisions are made." In that context Ireland had "punched above its weight many times".
He said the "blame game" should be avoided, whereby "everything bad happens in Brussels, everything that's good happens in the member-states".
Commenting that "It's so easy to demonise the EU", Dr Stubb said due credit should be given for Europe's role in brokering peace in Georgia and for the benefits deriving from the single currency during the current financial crisis.
Asked by Green Party Senator Deirdre de Burca if Finland understood Irish concerns about the erosion of neutrality, Dr Stubb said, "We do not consider that our commitment to EU membership and the Lisbon Treaty is a problem to our military non-alliance."
In response to Ms de Burca's point that there were concerns in Ireland about its citizens coming home in body-bags, Dr Stubb said every member state had the right to decide whether or not to take part in a dangerous mission: "No one forces anyone to participate in a military operation."
Asked by Fianna Fáil TD Thomas Byrne to comment on the Libertas claim that children over the age of three could be detained under the Lisbon Treaty, Dr Stubb said: "Those kind of arguments undermine the intelligence of the general public."
He expressed doubt that the European Court of Justice could impose a liberal abortion regime or less restrictive divorce laws on Ireland: "The ECJ has never been very quick to interpret anything to do with traditional ethical and moral issues."
Earlier, Dr Stubb met Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin at Iveagh House to discuss EU matters, the situation in the Caucasus and bilateral issues. Mr Martin is visiting Georgia this week to assess conditions on the ground.
Dr Stubb told The Irish Timesthat he had been very involved in brokering the ceasefire in Georgia earlier this year.