” ” ” “Praise to Finland for ratifying the Constitutional Treaty. The president of the EU Assembly, Josep Borrell, after the vote of Helsinki Parliament, gave "a warm welcome" today to the sixteenth country of the EU to have finally said yes to the Charter. The announcement had been made yesterday in Brussels by the President of the Finnish Parliament, Paavo Lipponen, during an interdepartmental meeting about the future of Europe. According to Borrell, "Finland sets a good example" for Europe. And he adds that, with their accession to the EU on January 1st, "Romania and Bulgaria will bring the ratifications to 18", since they voted on them at the time of approving the accession treaties. "In this way, two thirds of the EU member states, accounting for 56% of the population", will have adopted the Constitution. "It is a symbolic threshold that in many democracies would be enough to revise some fundamental regulations, but in the EU, where unanimity is still a prerequisite, this is not enough". According to Borrell, the Finnish ratification is "a confirmation of the opinion of those who think it would be wrong to stray too much from the text in the attempt to find a solution" to the deadlock that followed the French and Dutch "votes against". "The Constitutional Treaty is the well-balanced result of over two years of difficult negotiations".” “
