To borrow a footballing metaphor from this month’s euro soccer fest, has French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner scored a classic own goal?   His finger-wagging admonitions to the Irish on Monday have provoked a howl of universal outrage in Dublin.

Kouchner warned the Irish that a ‘no’ vote in Thursday’s referendum on the European Union’s reform treaty would be regarded with “gigantic incomprehension”, adding that it would be “very, very awkward if we couldn’t count on the Irish, who themselves have counted a great deal on Europe’s money”.

Health Minister Mary Harney, who has been working hard for a ‘yes’ vote, suggested Kouchner might be better off keeping his unhelpful comments to himself.    “I think we in Ireland have a proud record of making up our own minds,” she said.

The Irish edition of the Sun newspaper was less diplomatic.   The tabloid’s headline today said it all: “Frog off!”

The ‘yes’ camp has good cause for concern.   The latest opinion polls indicate a tight finish – one on Friday put the ‘no’ vote marginally ahead, another on Sunday gave the ‘yes’ camp the slightest of margins.    Their fear is that Kouchner’s ill-judged intervention could swing the undecided against the treaty.

Which would be a disaster for European Union reform and a disaster for France, which not only played a key role in defining the draft treaty but also takes up the rotating EU presidency on July 1^st.   

Little wonder that Brussels is in a panic.   A country of four million – less than one per cent of the total population of the European Union – could consign years of hard work and diplomacy to the rubbish bin.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who hopes to use the French EU presidency to drive forward the much-needed reform of European institutions, would be left to pick up the pieces.    He has promised to press on, come what may, but the engine of reform would have no more steam.