On July 1 2008, France took over the six-month rotating presidency of the European Union. The Eiffel Tower was beautifully lit up to honour the occasion, but the many issues on the agenda of the French indicate that the next six months will be more tough than sparkly.

French officials have many times stressed the priorities of the French presidency, namely climate change and energy, agriculture, defence, immigration, Mediterranean policy. However, these might be overshadowed by the efforts to keep the Lisbon Treaty up and running, which seems to be getting harder by the day.

After on June 12, when the Irish gave their “no” to Ireland ratifying the treaty, aimed at streamlining decision-making and reforming European institutions to increase their efficiency following the bloc's expansion, French president Nikolas Sarkozy, along with other European officials, urged the ratification process in other member states to continue. EU leaders hoped they will manage to reach a mutually agreeable solution with their Irish counterparts and keep the treaty alive. Sarkozy even scheduled a visit to Ireland for July.

Chances to save the Lisbon Treaty, however, started to look considerably smaller when Polish president Lech Kaczynski announced in an interview for Polish daily Dziennik that he would not sign the treaty since he believed that doing so after the Irish “no” was pointless. Poland's parliament approved the treaty back in April and Kaczynski signature was the only thing left for the ratification process to be completed.

The president's announcement came out on July 1 to suspiciously coincide with the launch of the French presidency, signalling that keeping the reform document up and running with not one, but two objecting member states may be a non-achievable aim.

Moreover, potential problems can arise in the Czech Republic as well, since there ratification cannot be completed before the constitutional court issues its verdict on whether the treaty is compliant with the country's constitutional order or not.