DUBLIN (AFP) — Ireland's new Foreign Minister Micheal Martin urged the country on Friday to vote "yes" to the European Union's key Lisbon Treaty in a crunch referendum next month.
Martin, who was switched from the portfolio of enterprise and trade in a cabinet reshuffle this week by new Prime Minister Brian Cowen, said the country would be making a "vital choice" on its relationship with Europe in the June 12 vote.
"This is major decision about our future and about the future of Europe," Martin said. "We will be sending the world another clear signal about how we see ourselves and where we want to go.
"The government sees the treaty as a logical step for the EU in an increasingly globalised world," Martin said in a statement to mark Ireland's celebrations for Europe Day.
It is the only one of 27 EU member states holding a referendum on the new treaty. French and Dutch voters rejected the EU's proposed constitution -- since replaced by the treaty -- in 2005, plunging the bloc into limbo.
Martin, 47, the son of former international boxer Paddy Martin, was promoted by Cowen following his election to succeed the long-serving Bertie Ahern on Wednesday.
Martin, who replaces Dermot Ahern at the foreign ministry, was elected to parliament in 1989 for the conservative Fianna Fail party and has also held the education and health portfolios.
A recent poll suggested the government's campaign to promote support for the EU treaty had suffered a sharp reversal, with the "yes" vote dropping to 35 percent, down eight points on a similar poll two months earlier.
Some 31 percent said they would vote "no", an increase of seven points.
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