The Star online: ANALYSIS - Mediator Merkel shines at debut EU summit
Mediator Merkel shines at debut EU summit
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - With characteristic low-key resolve, German Chancellor Angela Merkel pushed and prodded fellow leaders towards a budget deal at her first EU summit, establishing herself overnight as a formidable new force on the European stage. The 25-nation bloc clinched a long-term budget deal early on Saturday after Britain agreed to cut its EU rebate and France dropped resistance to a spending review that could reduce its cherished agricultural subsidies.Merkel, whose political career began just 15 years ago after the Berlin Wall fell, was a behind-the-scenes force in Brussels -- quietly nudging the British and French together and securing the backing of eastern European states with a strategically timed proposal to boost the total value of the budget. "Merkel played an extraordinarily important role behind the scenes," said Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel. "She has acted calm, sober and very professional." Romanian President Traian Basescu said: "She brokered the deal from start to finish. She was the first to break the deadlock with a proposal." It was not without cost. Merkel did cough up 100 million euros ($119.7 million) to the Poles in a last-ditch effort to strike a deal, opening herself to accusations that once again Germany was acting as Europe's paymaster. But the deal gets Europe back on track following the collapse of budget talks in June and humbling French and Dutch rejections of the bloc's proposed constitution.
