German Chancellor Angela Merkel has met with Polish President Lech Kaczynski to discuss his country's reservations about a new European Union constitutional treaty.
The chancellor, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the 27-nation bloc, was expected to urge the Polish leader Saturday to compromise on proposed changes in the EU voting system. Poland has threatened to use its veto power to stop any new treaty that would diminish its voting influence.
Ms. Merkel is meeting with European Union leaders ahead of a summit in Brussels where she hopes to outline how to revise the document which French and Dutch voters rejected in 2005. She plans to have an agreement ready for the next European parliamentary elections in 2009.
The German leader is scheduled to meet with prime ministers of the Czech Republic and Luxembourg on Sunday.
Warsaw believes that changes on voting rules, proposed in the new treaty, would give too much power to big countries such as Germany.
On Thursday in Warsaw, French President Nicholas Sarkozy and President Kaczynski expressed confidence that a compromise on the treaty would be reached at the summit in Brussels. The constitutional treaty revises the earlier document, which was styled as a constitution.
