Irish position: The Government wants the EU states who have ratified the EU constitution to help those who have not by agreeing to measures showing voters that the EU can make a difference to their lives, Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern said last night.
At a press conference, he said he had told the European Council that the Republic remained "very committed" to the planned EU constitution.
However, he could not say when the Republic would hold a referendum to ratify it.
The council had last night agreed to an extension of the "period of reflection" on the constitution, and there was no agreement that the period of reflection was to be finite, he said. "But I think people understand that the European elections in 2009 is the outer limit."
Dermot Ahern was representing the Taoiseach at the meeting of EU heads of state and government because of Charles Haughey's funeral.
He said that if the 15 or 16 countries that had already ratified the constitution were blaming the remainder of the 25, including the Republic, for not ratifying, "they have to be conscious that they need to assist us". The EU needed to show people it was taking action that could improve people's lives.
He cited as an example the proposal that mobile phone roaming charges could be abolished within the EU, a move that would benefit Irish consumers particularly because of the amount of travel between North and South.
Despite a growing belief within several member state governments that the constitution will not survive in its current form, Mr Ahern said there had been no support at last night's meeting for "cherrypicking" the constitution - scaling it down and implementing only parts of it.