Seven smaller EU countries, including Ireland, warned last night against setting up a permanent presidency of the European Union, and called for the retention of the existing six-month rotating presidency.
"We stick to the principle of a six-month rotating system," Luxembourg's Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker told a news conference, flanked by his Irish, Belgian, Finnish, Austrian, Dutch and Portuguese colleagues.
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Five large EU countries, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Britain, rallied in January behind a proposal drafted by Paris and Berlin for a double presidency of the bloc, saying it would enable an enlarged EU to pull its weight on the world stage.
That plan calls for a new position for a long-term, full-time president of the European Council of national governments. This leader would chair EU summits and represent the EU internationally.
The plan would also have the president of the European Commission, the EU's executive body, directly elected by the European Parliament. But the smaller countries fear the president would be under the thumb of the big states and would need a new and costly bureaucracy and prove confusing to both Europeans and the outside world.
"We think the European Union does not need any new institutions," Mr Juncker said.
Former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing, who is heading a 150-member Convention drafting a first constitution for an enlarged EU, is due to present its final text to EU leaders at a summit in Greece in June.
But EU leaders are due to resolve outstanding issues on the new constitution on April 16th.
The seven countries also agreed to support plans for an EU "foreign minister", who would also sit in the Commission, and to further extend the use of majority voting in the EU's decision making process.