Berlin– European leaders took a small but significant step Sunday toward overhauling the European Union – and finally lifting the bloc out of two years of confusion and hand-wringing over its failed draft constitution.
Politely but firmly nudged by German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the assembled presidents and prime ministers vowed to seek a treaty establishing “a renewed common basis” for the 27-member bloc before the next European Parliament elections in 2009.
The EU is celebrating its 50th birthday since the 1957 Treaty of Rome founded the European Economic Community.
EU leaders agree on the need to overhaul the EU, which has grown from six members in 1957 to 27. Its original role of promoting economic cooperation has expanded into an integrated bloc with a shared currency, a common border and extensive cooperation on the environment, immigration and defense and foreign policy.
Most feel that the EU’s structure has failed to keep pace, leading to policy gridlock. The stalled constitution would have instituted a full-time EU president and foreign minister and faster decision-making.
Substantive talks on the treaty are unlikely until after the French presidential election in April.
More local news briefs
SUPERIOR TOWNSHIP, Mich.
3 kids sleep through brief theft of van
A thief drove off in a minivan that was left running with three children sleeping inside, but the vehicle was found minutes later with all three unharmed and still asleep, authorities said.
The children’s mother had stopped at a convenience store Friday night just outside Ann Arbor. As she left the store, she saw the van being driven away, police said. A witness reported that the van had been driven across the street to a road that leads to an apartment complex.
Washtenaw County sheriff’s deputies found the van with the children, ages 6, 5 and 19 months, but the thief got away.
GALVESTON, Texas
Pair who fell from cruise ship rescued
A man and a woman fell overboard from a cruise ship in the Gulf of Mexico early Sunday, but both were rescued after a four-hour search.
The 22-year-old man and 20-year-old woman fell 50 to 60 feet from a cabin balcony, said Julie Benson, spokeswoman for Princess Cruises. The Grand Princess was about 150 miles off the coast of Galveston.
The captain turned the ship around, and the crew used high- powered spotlights and rescue boats in the search.
The pair, whom the cruise line declined to name, were examined by the ship’s medical staff and “appear to be in satisfactory condition,” Benson said.
WEST WARWICK, R.I.
Hit-and-run kills teen where friend had died
A teenager was killed by a hit-and-run driver at the same spot where his 14-year-old friend had died in a car crash just hours earlier.
Andrew Coit, 18, was hit by a car after 4 a.m. Saturday as he played a guitar at a makeshift memorial to Darien Plass, 14, on West Warwick’s Main Street. Plass died after driving his mother’s minivan into a utility pole late Friday, friends said.
“He wanted to play one last song for (Plass), and that was the last time anyone saw him. He loved singing,” said Coit’s friend Dennis Sullivan.
Sullivan said the mourners remained at the memorial until about 4 a.m. but that Coit stayed behind to play one more song for Plass by himself.
Minutes later, police received a call of a man down, and an ambulance crew found Coit on the sidewalk. He was pronounced dead at a hospital.
Police were searching for the hit-and-run driver.
BELFAST, Northern Ireland
Power-sharing may be somewhat delayed
Britain said Sunday it intends to try to hand power immediately to a new Catholic-Protestant administration for Northern Ireland – but is open to Protestant demands for an extension to May.
Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain said Saturday’s decision by the major Protestant party, the Democratic Unionists, to reject today’s deadline would not spell the end of Britain’s decade-old effort to forge a stable power-sharing administration.
Hain noted that the Democratic Unionists have pledged for the first time to forge a coalition with Sinn Fein, the major Catholic-backed party, by an unspecified date in May. Britain would do what it could to make sure this happened, he said.
Hain signed an order Sunday clearing the way for the Northern Ireland Assembly – the 108- member legislature that forms the bedrock for power-sharing – to convene today so it could elect all 12 members of the envisioned administration.
CARACAS, Venezuela
Chavez to create “collective property”
President Hugo Chavez said Sunday his administration plans to create “collective property” as part of sweeping reforms toward socialism, and that officials would move to seize control of large ranches and redistribute lands deemed “idle.”
The Venezuelan leader, speaking on his television and radio program “Hello President,” said the government was “advancing quickly” with a concept of “social, or collective, property” to be included in forthcoming constitutional reforms.
“It’s property that belongs to everyone, and it’s going to benefit everyone,” said Chavez, who vowed to undermine capitalism’s continued influence in Venezuela.
Chavez did not elaborate but stressed that collective property must benefit workers equally: “It cannot be production to generate profits for one person or a small group of people that become rich exploiting peons who end up becoming slaves, living in poverty and misery their entire lives.”
