Brussels blog

Nicolas Sarkozy’s  proposal for a "wise men’s committee " to meditate on the European Union’s long-term future, and to report back in the first half of 2009, is ruffling all sorts of feathers around the EU. As Margot Wallström, the European Commission vice-president responsible for communication strategy, put it the other day: "Wise men? What about the wise women? And since this group is expected to work out solutions for the future of Europe, should we not involve young people?"

In fairness to the French president, I don’t think he has a fiendish plan to exclude women from his proposed committee, which would consider the EU’s future up to the years 2020-2030. He thinks the committee should have 10 to 12 members. Surely there’d be room for Edith Cresson in a group that big?

But the real problem with Sarkozy’s idea lies elsewhere – to be precise, in the EU’s relationship with Turkey.

Sarkozy unveiled his proposal in August at an ambassadors’ conference in Paris. There he said that, if the wise men’s committee got off the ground, he would lift France’s objections to opening new chapters in Turkey’s EU accession negotiations.

This caused a lot of excited chatter to the effect that Sarkozy was softening his opposition to full Turkish membership of the EU. What nonsense. One glance at his speech reveals that he said: "I’m not going to be hypocritical. Everyone knows that I’m only in favour of association [for Turkey]."

In fact, there is another way of interpreting Sarkozy’s idea – namely, that if he doesn’t get his way on the wise men’s committee, he will block all further EU membership talks with Turkey.

Moreover, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that what Sarkozy wants the wise men’s committee to report in 2009 is that full Turkish membership of the EU is incompatible with the EU’s long-term interests. So whichever way the dice fall, Sarkozy plans to win.

Unless, of course, Wallström can pack the wise men’s committee with a squad of very determined, very pro-Turkish women.