Why Europe may soon split along religious lines

Stephen Pollard says that if embryonic stem cell research is banned in some parts of Europe — as it might be under the new EU treaty — old hostilities will resurface

I wouldn’t care to estimate how many words have been written so far on the draft EU reform treaty. If and when it becomes a legal document, the English language will have been near exhausted for new terms to express the fundamental theme of almost every comment — that it is the old constitution in another guise.

But for all the words and all the assertions, almost everyone has ignored one of the most important elements of the treaty — unsurprisingly, given that it’s buried in a footnote.

It’s a truism with EU documents that the devil is in the detail, but truisms are called that because they are, well, true. And few people seem to have realised the profound importance of footnote 18 to the proposed draft wording for a replacement of Article 6 on fundamental rights.