When European Union leaders meet in Brussels on June 16th they must decide if they want to carry on the process of ratifying the EU constitution as planned, postpone it, stop it altogether or speed it up.
When they signed the constitution last year, the leaders agreed to ratify it in each country by November 2006. If 20 out of 25 countries had ratified it by that date, and others had been unable to, the leaders would meet again to decide how to proceed.
Some EU leaders, along with Commission president José Manuel Barroso believe all countries should continue ratifying the constitution as scheduled, despite this week's referendums in France and the Netherlands. Others argue that the treaty is now effectively dead and should simply be abandoned rather than facing a succession of failed referendums.
Instead of ditching the constitution altogether, some governments think the EU leaders should agree to extend the deadline for ratification and freeze the process while Europe enters a "period of reflection".
Another idea that has emerged is to accelerate the ratification process by holding a "super-poll" of simultaneous referendums or parliamentary votes in the 13 countries that have not yet had their say on the constitution. After that, EU leaders could assess public opinion on the treaty throughout the EU and decide how to proceed.
