Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski said Tuesday he might put off a referendum on the European Union constitution from his favored October date if the June 16-17 EU summit took no decision on the fate of the charter.

Poland should not set a date for the vote until the EU had discussed the crisis caused by the rejection of the constitution by French and Dutch voters, Kwasniewski said in an interview, noting also that Britain had shelved plans to set up its own referendum.

He said the Brussels EU summit would probably not decide a way forward for the bloc. "(At the summit) we may decide to give ourselves a few months and meet (again) when we are better prepared," he said. "A lack of a decision is also a decision."

Asked whether Poland should still hold a referendum on October 9 if the summit was inconclusive, Kwasniewski said: "For us this will be a serious question. We must realize that a timing in 2006 may not be easy, but we shall see."

Recent surveys showed that most Poles would back the charter and strongly support the EU a year after joining the bloc.

The favored October date for a Polish referendum, coinciding with the presidential election, was chosen to ensure turnout tops the 50 percent needed to make it binding.

Meanwhile, NATO General-Secretary Jaap de Hoop Scheffer was quoted as saying Tuesday European integration on defence and security matters must continue despite French and Dutch voters' rejection.

The need for a strong Europe had not changed since the "No" votes in France and the Netherlands last week, Scheffer told the International Herald. "I realize it is very serious and that the EU will enter a period when it will have to do some reflecting on what happened in France. It is very important that in the areas of defence and security, Europe will further integrate."

Also Tuesday, European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet said that Europe's move toward a single market was on track despite recent "no" votes in France and the Netherlands.

"We are proceeding too slowly but we are proceeding" with unifying the market, he told a conference of central bankers in Beijing.

And Luxembourg's prime minister Tuesday dismissed any possibility that individual countries might abandon the euro and called on EU leaders to show the world that the 25-nation bloc is still functioning despite the apparent demise of its proposed constitution.

"It is just inconceivable that a country could envisage dropping out of the euro. The euro belongs to us all," Jean-Claude Juncker, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said on the second day of EU finance ministers' talks.

Some Italian officials have called for a return of the lira, criticizing the European Central Bank's one-size-fits-all interest rate policy and blaming the euro for higher prices. The issue has stimulated some discussion but has been ruled out by most officials.

(China Daily June 8, 2005)