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Nato ministers on Friday offered Montenegro a formal plan to join the alliance, just days after the EU announced it would lift visas for its citizens.

"With a sustained effort at further reform, today's invitation to join the Membership Action Plan (MAP) will be a stepping stone to the ultimate goal: full membership in Nato," the secretary-general of the military alliance, Anders Fogh Rasmussen said at a press conference in Brussels.

Back in Podgorica, the Nato move, also connected with the recent lifting of EU visas for its citizens, is likely to boost the image of the government.

But voices in the civil society warn that this will not mean an acceleration of democratic reforms, which so far are seen as being mostly on paper.

Momcilo Radulovic from the European Movement, a Podgorica-based NGO, says there is still need for more transparency, good governance, and a stronger fight against organised crime and corruption. He was sceptical that Nato alone could push for these reforms.

"They are only interested in reforming the military and security structures. But once we get EU candidate status, maybe at the end of 2010 or early 2011, there will be more pressure on the government," he told this website.

The Lisbon Treaty changes the rules on how decisions are reached by the EU because decision-making has become unwieldy since the accession of 10 countries, mostly from eastern and central Europe, in 2004 and two more in 2007.

It hands more power to the European Parliament, which shares some legislative responsibilities with the European Commission - the EU executive and a powerful regulatory body. Member states' leaders retain a lot of power.

Ms Ashton, whose meteoric ascent has come as a surprise even to her, will have to hit the ground running. She is set to attend an EU-Ukraine summit on 4 December. The first EU foreign ministers' meeting, which she is supposed to chair under the new rules, will take place on 7 December.

It will also fall to her to oversee the setting up the EU's external action service, a thousands-strong diplomatic outfit that one EU official described as the greatest-ever change to the commission's bureaucracy.

Her 1 December start opens up other questions, such as what will happen to the trade portfolio which she will vacate and what will be the role of Benita Ferrero-Waldner, the current EU external relations commissioner.

Ms Ashton's new job merges the external relations commissioner post with that of the high representative for foreign policy, currently held by Javier Solana, for the first time putting foreign policy clout together with the financial means to implement it into the hands of one person.

Once in force on 1 December, the Lisbon Treaty will merge the current military planning unit with a civilian one and fold all operational and planning divisions into the diplomatic service, due to be fully up and running by 2012.

The military chiefs will no longer report to the rotating EU presidency, but directly to the new EU foreign minister, who will also be a vice-president of the European Commission.

European Union member states are sharply divided over whether to condemn Israel for its bombing of UN schools and other buildings during its 23-day war on Gaza.

Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Romania are opposed to condemning the shelling of UN Relief and Works Agency infrastructure and do not want the EU to call for an international investigation of alleged war crimes by both Israel and the Hamas governors of Gaza, according to sources close to discussions amongst EU diplomats.

Under a plan approved by the United Nations Security Council last week, some 2,000 EU police, justice and customs officials will take over UN duties in Kosovo.

It also foresees the EU mission being deployed under a UN mandate and take a neutral position regarding Kosovo's status – something which pleases Belgrade, but enrages Pristina.

Pristina is still opposed to the compromise deal between Serbia, the European Union and the United Nations on the deployment of EULEX, the EU's police and justice mission in Kosovo, and its stance will not change, Kosovo's prime minister, Hashim Thaci, said on Sunday (16 November).

"Kosovo will not change its position. It is the points of this plan that need to change. We have a state position and we will defend that position until the end," Mr Thaci was reported as saying by Serbian news portal B92.net.

Under pressure from Belgrade, the UN presented a revised six-point plan to Kosovo leaders last week, under which EULEX would be neutral regarding Kosovo's status and would enter the Serb-dominated parts of Kosovo.

Pristina considers that the revised proposal clashes with its interests, however.

With Russia's backing for the G20 summit, French President Nicolas Sarkozy proposed a new security and defence arrangement between the EU, Russia and the US to be agreed at a summit mid-2009, calling both on Moscow and Washington to refrain from deploying missiles until that date.

Mr Sarkozy was speaking at a press conference on Friday (14 November) following the EU-Russia summit held in Nice, alongside his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev.

In 2007, during French Bastille Day celebrations in which troops from every EU member state marched down the Champs-Elysees, Mr Sarkozy said the EU should construct a unified military.

The Bastille comments followed similar remarks from German Chancellor Angela Merkel in March of the same year on the occasion of the EU's 50th birthday. At the time, she said in an interview that she supported the idea of a unified EU army.

However, the UK, the largest of the EU's big-three military spenders ahead of France and Germany, has until now opposed the idea of a common EU force, arguing that it would unnecessarily duplicate tasks performed by NATO.

According to the Lisbon Treaty, rejected in June by the Irish in a referendum, the North Atlantic alliance "remains the foundation of the collective defence of [EU] members," with NATO always headed by a US general, however.

The EUMM will not be under UN or OSCE authority. Instead, it will be an autonomous mission led by the EU under the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP).

Morel, 64, is a former ambassador to Russia (1992-1996) and is currently the EU representative to Central Asia. He will work under the authority of EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and his mandate will be agreed shortly, sources said. 

Initially a Polish-Swedish proposal endorsed in June by all member states, the Eastern Partnership is designed to deepen ties with the "European neighbours" to the east, balancing the 'Mediterranean Union' with the southern "neighbours of Europe," as Polish MEP Jacek Saryusz-Wolski put it.

The Georgian conflict sped up the process of drafting the eastern policy by the European Commission, with president Jose Manuel Barroso scheduled to sketch out the main features already at the EU summit on 15 October.