PARIS -- In December 2000, the 15 members of the European Union signed the Nice Treaty, which was designed to remove the obstacles to the proposed expansion of the EU by 10 countries -- eight from the former Soviet bloc plus plus Cyprus and Malta. Like all treaties, it had to be ratified. Fourteen governments decided to leave this task to their parliaments. Ireland preferred to call a referendum.
Ireland has benefited greatly from its entry into the union. Thanks to the EU aid that it has received over the years, it has gone from being a country that once seemed destined to suffer from endless misery and mass emigration to one that has a gross national product equivalent its former British ruler.
It was thus a great surprise when Ireland's "no" vote against the treaty carried last year by 54 percent -- enough to block the EU enlargement process. But deciding to try again, the Dublin government launched an intense, costly campaign that in the end spurred Ireland to give up its 80-year-old foreign policy of strict neutrality. In turn, fellow EU members pledged to respect the island's neutrality.