Schröder and Prodi Try to Make Up

Gerhard Schröder and Romano Prodi were last night trying to bury the hatchet between Germany and the European Commission, following months of sniping by Berlin.

A dinner meeting between the commission president and the chancellor at a restaurant in the Belgian capital was deemed necessary after repeated complaints of anti-German bias by an increasingly combative Mr Schröder.

The chancellor, who does not share the euro-enthusiasm of his predecessor, Helmut Kohl, has sharpened his tone with the approach of September's elections, in which he faces a battle against the conservative Edmund Stoiber.

Mr Schröder's main theme has been that the commission's economic liberalisation strategy does not take account of Germany's needs, especially those of the industrial heartland of the east - where the election will be lost or won.

Mr Prodi made clear in advance, however, that Berlin cannot expect any favours. "I cannot permit special concessions," he told the newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

For his part, Mr Schröder has suggested recently that, given how much the EU milks the German cash cow, it should stroke it instead of beating it.

Unease at EU expansion and failure to reform the common agricultural policy have also been factors in Germany's disenchantment.

Officials in both Brussels and Berlin say that Germany has now become more confident about asserting its own interests in the EU, in a way that France, Britain and Spain have always done.