French and German leaders pledged at a summit this evening to resolve a festering controversy over multi-billion-euro European farm subsidies by December to remove a major obstacle to EU enlargement.
Meeting in Schwerin, French President Jacques Chirac, Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and Germany's Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder signed off on a timetable for ending the row.
This will include a gathering of the French and German leaders and the two countries' foreign ministers at Schroeder's private home in Hanover at the end of August or beginning of September.
Monthly high-level meetings are to follow regardless of the outcome of German elections on September 22nd, which Schroeder is widely expected to lose.