AT THE World Economic Forum at Davos earlier this month, the Czech Prime Minister, Dr Vaclav Klaus, was waxing eloquent about his country's opposition to farm subsidies. If anything needed to be changed, he declared, it was the EU's agricultural policy, not that of the Czech Republic.
Dr Klaus is a professional economist, a politician who admires the Thatcherite revolution and above all else, some would say, a Czech, meaning he is outspoken and forthright in his views.
The combination sometimes rubs people up the wrong way. Mr Hans van den Broek, the EU Commissioner in charge of relations with central and eastern Europe, was duly responsive: "It is not the European Union that wants to join the Czech Republic; I speak for 15 EU member states".
In reply to a question during his visit to Dublin this week, Dr Klaus was equally trenchant about the Visegrad group, set up after the collapse of communism for economic and security co operation in central Europe.
Any significance that it might have had for co ordinating EU applications has long been abandoned, but it still functions as a forum in which the Hungarians, Poles, Czechs and Slovaks exchange views.
In Dr Klaus's belief, reflecting the strong national element in Czech policy, Visegrad not only does not exist, but never has existed in any practical sense.
He deploys formidable irony. "How do you spell it? Visegrad is an artificial creation of several western politicians and most of the journalists. A typical standard person in the Czech Republic doesn't know what the term means. Visegrad is a hill and a castle in Prague, Visehrad in Czech pronunciation.
"In the permanent repetition of the adjective Visegrad we heard attempts by western Europe to push us away from themselves: `What about trying first to co operate among yourselves and then we will observe whether you are doing sufficient and may accept you as members?'
"That was very sensitive for us. A new artificial sub regional integration in central and eastern Europe after Comecon simply wasn't a reasonable idea. Nobody was listening to that."
But he stresses there is close cooperation with the Czech Republic's neighbours through the Central European Free Trade Area (CEFTA) which came into effect three years ago.
It now includes Slovenia in addition to the Visegrad group members and has plans for spreading its net to Romania and Bulgaria and possibly the Baltic states. "You in the west stubbornly refuse to notice CEFTA, but for us it is a very prospective and positive organisation." Most tariffs have already been removed between member states.
Politically, socially and economically, the Czechs argue, their republic enjoys greater stability than its neighbours: for example, during Dr Klaus's period in government there have been six Polish prime ministers. It makes little sense, therefore, to co ordinate positions in regard to EU membership.
One of Dr Klaus's missions in Dublin was to secure "another small signalling step" from the EU during the Irish presidency: "We need positive statements, positive signals, for domestic consumption."
He pointed out that the Czech Republic has its own separate history, and now that the crucial moment of transition was past expectations were high.
"The surgery from communism to a free society and market economy is over and we are already, as I call it, in the rehabilitation centre. People don't compare themselves with the countries east and south of us, but with the countries west of us. Simply they want to be a normal European country in all meanings of the word.
"But it takes two to tango, and we can't dictate the moment of membership. We know the EU has internal things to solve, and I understand that without a redefinition of the structure".
EU institutions at the Inter Governmcntal Conference, there can't be any enlargement of the European Union. I accept that."
More irony when Semtex, one of the better known Czechoslovak products, is mentioned. "How do you spell it? What's Semtex? It is probably a product of one of our chemical factories whether now or 10 years ago. We have never distributed it to anyone here, and so I have no comment. I have no idea, never heard, never touched."
Asked whether, as a leading monetarist, he sometimes feels isolated in post Thatcher times, applying doctrine in a very particular situation, he replies: "In some respects I feel lonely, not just in central and eastern Europe but in western Europe as well.
"But in many respects I think our voice is very general. Definitely there are more general rules of transformation than the specifics of the Czech Republic."
Which, more or less, is where Mr van den Broek comes in.