Czech court delays Lisbon verdict till after EU summit

(PRAGUE) - The highest court in the Czech Republic on Tuesday delayed until after an upcoming EU summit its decision on whether the Lisbon Treaty dovetails with the nation's constitution.

Its one-week adjournment leaves on tenterhooks the fate of the treaty to overhaul EU decision-making, with eurosceptic President Vaclav Klaus refusing to sign it before the court hands down judgement.

"The court will confer," constitutional court chairman Pavel Rychetsky said during a televised hearing on Tuesday. "For this purpose, the court hearing is adjourned till Tuesday, November 3, 9:00 am (0800 GMT)."

The Czech Republic is the only one of the 27 EU member states -- whose leaders meet in Brussels on Thursday and Friday -- that has yet to ratify the treaty, which needs to be adopted by all nations before it can take effect.

The case before the constitutional court in Prague stems from a complaint lodged by eurosceptic Czech senators and fears that the Lisbon Treaty means surrendering too much national powers to the European Union.

"No matter what the outcome will be ... the Czech public must realise that the Czech Republic's independence is being handed over" to Brussels, senator Jiri Oberfalzer told reporters outside the hearing.

The constitutional court has dealt with the Lisbon Treaty once before, last year, when it concluded that contested provisions within it respect the Czech constitution.

But it failed to assess the treaty as a whole, leaving the door open for the latest complaint.

Klaus angered his EU partners when he sought a Czech opt-out from the treaty three weeks ago, in what his critics took as a fresh attempt to delay its adoption.

The proposed opt-out -- to ensure the treaty will not allow ethnic Germans forced out of the former Czechoslovakia after World War II for Nazi collaboration to reclaim their property -- is on the EU summit agenda.

London and Warsaw already have opt-outs -- ensuring for Britain that EU laws and court will not prevail over its judicial system, and for Poland that it would not be forced to allow gay marriages.

Czech EU minister Stefan Fule suggested last week the Czech exemption would be a general one, comprising a comma and the words "Czech Republic" attached to "Great Britain" and "Poland" in the treaty's protocol.

The European Union has been in suspense awaiting Klaus's signature, the last step in the Czech ratification process after parliament approved the Lisbon Treaty earlier this year.

With the current impasse, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, who won a second five-year term last month, is unable to nominate a new commission, because it is unclear what legal basis he should use to do so.

The mandate of the current commission expires at the end of October, and a spokesman has said it would stay on in a caretaker role until the fate of the treaty is resolved.