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FOR A long time it looked like there might not be a deal but a compromise was emerging even as EU leaders and their police outriders zoomed into the Justus Lipsius building in Brussels.

Waiting in the foyer for them was Swedish prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, the man running the selection process as holder of the EU’s rotating presidency. Tired-looking after prolonged telephone diplomacy, Reinfeld’s sheepish bearing betrayed the strain of trying to hammer out a pact with 26 political leaders of assorted hue.