MINISTER FOR Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin has suggested that Ireland's membership of the EU has helped it to avoid the type of financial meltdown being experienced by Iceland.
He has also asked the public to reflect on Europe's support in the crisis - and on a danger that Ireland could be marginalised within the union due to its rejection of the Lisbon Treaty.
"We can see the difficulties that Iceland is having as a country that is on its own. This suggests that being at the heart of Europe is far more preferable than being on the margins of Europe and going the isolationist route," Mr Martin said at an EU foreign ministers' meeting. "These are issues for us to reflect on domestically."
He said this financial crisis was helping to concentrate minds about the importance of the EU institutions to small countries such as Ireland. He said the European Central Bank had played a vital role by providing liquidity to Irish banks. This was in marked contrast to the financial crisis situation in the early 1990s when the euro did not exist, he added.
Mr Martin, who will accompany Taoiseach Brian Cowen to the EU leaders' summit in Brussels tomorrow, warned that voting No to Lisbon was perceived by EU partners as Ireland adopting a more marginal and isolationist approach. He warned that this could result in a loss of influence.
"This is not by any malicious act by anybody but it is just by definition that we would lose that influence that we have built up over 30 years. That can evaporate and be lost over a period of time," he said.
Despite growing anticipation in Brussels that the Government would agree to hold a second referendum on Lisbon in October 2009, he denied that any decision had been taken. He said the way forward may not become clear until the EU summit in December.
EU states have accepted that Mr Cowen cannot provide a solution tomorrow, but French president Nicolas Sarkozy is pressurising him to come up with a firm plan in December. With the question of Ireland's ratification of Lisbon relegated at the summit to a speech by Mr Cowen on what went wrong in June, EU leaders will focus on the financial crisis. The draft conclusions for the summit, obtained by The Irish Times, show EU leaders intend to call for those involved in the financial system to be made more accountable.
"The real performance of company executives should be reflected in their remuneration, including their severance pay, which should be in line with their actual contribution to the success of the company," says the paper.
Meanwhile, EU foreign ministers agreed to suspend a travel ban on Belarussian president Alexander Lukashenko and other members of his administration yesterday. Belarussian officials suspected of being involved in the disappearance of political prisoners will still be barred from travelling to Europe, said an EU official.
EU-Belarus relations have warmed since August when Minsk released three detainees considered political prisoners and declined to follow Russia in recognising breakaway regions of Georgia following the August hostilities. But several states objected to completely restoring diplomatic ties with Lukashenko, who was dubbed Europe's last dictator by the US, over concerns at the way elections were held last month.