PRODI BOYCOTTS SUMMIT PRESS CONFERENCE.

Romano Prodi's spokesman has rejected suggestions that the Commission President's failure not to attend the European Council's final press conference in Ghent on October 19 (see separate article, same section) indicates that the Commission and its President were being marginalised. Speaking on October 22, Jonathan Faull, Prodi's the spokesman, said: "The President believes he had already said what he had to say at the press conference at the end of the afternoon and thought he would not have the opportunity to do it as he would have liked at the evening one." The spokesman admitted Prodi's decision had its origins at the previous summit, the extraordinary Council meeting of September 21, where Mr Prodi judged that he did not have enough time to comment on the results of the achievements. The President expressed his feelings in a letter to Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt on October 12.Mr Faull also insisted on the contrasting "style and manner" of the two men and denied that the incident was be masking an interinstitutional crisis. "The role of the Commission is intact", said Jonathan Faull...