Roozbeh: The EU is the 25 countries, governed by an elected parliament and a nominbated commission. It's a system similar to the system used in France, where the president and legislature are elected, but then the president nominates his cabinet. Anyway, I am sure that in the coming months, the EU position on patents will be clarified, and will be more in line with Michel Rocard than Charlie McCreevy.
Update: By the way, one of the things the proposed EU constitution does is to limit the power of the commission to change reccommendations of the parliament. That's the main reason why I would be voting yes if the French let me have a vote (which they don't), or the Irish let me vote by mail (which they don't).
There are 2 sessions on patents planned during GUADEC on the user day too, though. One is on software patents in Europe, and another is on the movement (which is gaining momentum) in North America advocating reform of the US patent system. Both should be interesting.
It has to be said, though, that mixing up free software (which is a construction of copyright) and patents is playing into the hands of people who use the phrase "Intellectual property" to blur the lines between copyright, trademark, trade secret and patent issues. Let's avoid that trap.