Real Property

The treaty would modernize the decision-making and boost the role of the European bloc on the world stage. It would also create the office of a permanent EU president, a position of leadership that the European figures are already trying to get backstage.

It's a deal, said Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy, referring to the acceptance of the demands of the Czech Republic.

Some diplomats said EU leaders present at the negotiations in this city had accepted the demands, which pave the way for Czech President Vaclav Klaus to sign the treaty if the country's constitutional court determines that the covenant does not violate national law. It is expected that the court issues its ruling on Tuesday.

Diplomats, who asked not to be identified because the agreement has not been announced publicly, said they hoped to sign the deal before Klaus year-end if the court favors the treaty.

Klaus, an ardent skeptic of the viability of the European Union have refused to sign the treaty until its country be offered an option to withdraw from the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the new EU treaty.

Czech leader requested the option to fears of property claims of dispossessed Germans their land and expelled from the country after the Second World War.

Diplomats said that neighboring countries such as Hungary and Slovakia, which also feared impact on the demands of Klaus, agreed a text as negotiated solution that would allow the exit option.

Van Rompuy said the Czech output option was similar to the choices offered to Poland and Britain.

Klaus had used the requirement of exit option for trying to sabotage the ratification of the treaty which is opposed, fearing that it would give too many national powers to EU institutions in Brussels.

However, intensified the pressure on him to sign after being left alone in his stance when Irish votersapproved the treaty in a second referendum earlier this month.

EU officials have said the laws relating to World War II that Klaus is concerned are not threatened in any way for the charter for the new treaty, which only applies to EU laws.

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The Associated Press reporter Raf Caserta contributed to this report.