A top German court has ruled that the Lisbon Treaty conforms with the country's constitution. However, it also ruled that before the document can be ratified, the country's parliament's powers needed to be strengthened.

However, the ruling is widely seen as clearing the way for German adoption of the Lisbon Treaty, meaning President Lech Kaczyński, a long-time critic of the document, has lost one of two key allies he had in the EU-27 bloc which opposed the agreement.

Recently President Kaczyński told a gathering of diplomats that “at the moment there are only two keys [for the European acceptance of the Treaty]: one is in the Federal Republic of Germany, where the German Constitutional Tribunal will decide, the second is the Republic of Ireland.”

“If the Irish accept the Treaty, if it is accepted by the German Constitutional tribunal, [my] signature which is as yet missing, will be there,” he assured.

After the Germans approve the Lisbon treaty as expected, Ireland, the Czech Republic and Poland will be the only EU member states which have not yet ratified the agreement, meant to streamline legal and diplomatic issues between the members of the European Union.