Czechs nominate Stefan Fuele for EU executive (Roundup)

Nov 10, 2009, 11:44 GMT

   Prague - Stefan Fuele, the Czech minister for European affairs, is the Czech Republic's candidate for a post at the European Commission, Prime Minister Jan Fischer said Tuesday.

   'We are dispatching a good candidate to Brussels,' Fischer told reporters at a briefing televised on the CT24 news channel.

   A seasoned diplomat, Fuele, 47, had served as the Czech Republic's ambassador to NATO, Britain and Lithuania before he assumed his post in Fischer's caretaker cabinet.

   His nomination is a result of a last-minute agreement between the two major Czech political parties, Mirek Topolanek's centre-right Civic Democrats and Jiri Paroubek's rival Social Democrats.

   The two largest parties favoured Fuele over Vladimir Spidla, the Czech Republic's outgoing representative at the Commission.

   Fuele and Spidla were the last contenders for the EU job from which the interim cabinet was choosing on Tuesday, the premier said.

   Fischer's announcement came after weeks of party haggling over the nomination. The proposed candidates also included the premier himself and the country's central bank chief, Zdenek Tuma.

   EU leaders are expected to debate the composition of the next European Commission at a mid-November extraordinary summit.

   The two new EU top offices are part of the 27-member bloc's ambitious reform outlined by the so-called Lisbon Treaty. The race for filling these positions kicked off on November 3, when the Czech Republic, the last hold-out on the treaty, ratified the reform pact.