Slovak president ratifies EU's reforming Lisbon Treaty

(BRATISLAVA) - Slovak president Ivan Gasparovic signed the EU's reforming Lisbon Treaty on Monday, wrapping up the country's fraught ratification and making it the 13th country to have completed the process.

"The Lisbon Treaty is a compromise for Europe," Gasparovic said at a press conference adding further discussions about reshaping the 27-country bloc are still needed.

Slovak lawmakers voted in favour of the treaty, aimed at providing a new framework for the expanded EU to operate, in April after an ugly two-month standoff between the leftwing coalition of Prime Minister Robert Fico and the centre-right opposition.

The standoff raised worries in Brussels that the small, former communist Central European country could derail the ratification process that requires all EU members to approve the treaty before it can take effect.

Opposition parties refused to vote for the treaty in protest at the government's proposal for a new media law, attacked by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) as well as the local media for limiting press freedom.

But the three opposition parties eventually broke ranks when the Hungarian Coalition Party decided to vote for the treaty "to protect Slovakia's good name abroad."

The switch gave Fico the handful of opposition votes required in the 150-seat parliament to reach the 90 target for approving the treaty.

Slovakia becomes the 13th country after Austria, Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania and Slovenia to pass the treaty according to the EU's executive body, the European Commission.

The Lisbon Treaty replaces the draft EU constitution which was ditched after French and Dutch voters rejected it in referenda in 2005. This time round, only the Republic of Ireland has called a referendum on the treaty, which should take effect at the start of 2009.