The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, has said he is not interested in the post of president of the European Commission, which will become vacant next year.
Speaking in Dublin after a meeting with the presidents of the different political groups in the European Parliament, Mr Ahern also said there was no sense of crisis after EU leaders failed to reach agreement last weekend on a constitution for the Union.
Mr Ahern said at a press conference that with the president of the European Parliament, Mr Pat Cox, that the next presidency of the European Commission was an issue that had to be resolved.
"The new president of the commission is a matter that we have to complete in our June council and we'll have to do that ... I'm not interested anyway."
The Taoiseach said that there was no agreement with the US authorities on a date for a possible EU-US summit in Ireland during Ireland's presidency of the EU in the first half of 2004. He noted that he was already likely to meet with president Bush on three occasions: at the St Patrick's Day celebrations, at a G8 meeting and at a NATO summit.
"The question of trying to deal with the EU agenda, perhaps it could be around the G8. But if it's to be here, it'll probably be around the end of June." On the failure to reach agreement on an EU constitution, Mr Ahern said the Government would assess in February or March whether a deal was possible.
"Would we like to complete it, of course we would. But we can't do that unless there's a consensus and there certainly was not a consensus last week. If we believe at any time that we can conclude the business of the inter-governmental conference, we'll conclude," he said.
Mr Ahern told the meeting with MEPs earlier yesterday morning that improving the relationship between the EU and the US would be a crucial priority for the presidency. "We need to rebuild the relationship on the basis of shared values and pragmatic cooperation on the vast range of political, economic, trade and justice and home affairs issues on the table."
Mr Cox said that MEPs had reason to believe that the Irish presidency could do some "running repairs on what is a strained but robust and essential relationship". He noted that the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, had spoken in a "holistic" sense of the EU-US relationship. The problems should not be seen in isolation. "Let's look at the full picture, including the bits that are difficult, but not only at the bits that are difficult if we are actually to make progress."
