BERLIN (MNI) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday
reaffirmed her demand that the next head of the International Monetary
Fund should be an European again.
The IMF announced Wednesday that managing director Dominique
Strauss-Kahn hat told the Executive Board of his intention to resign.
The French national was arrested Saturday in New York on charges that he
attempted to rape a chambermaid at his Manhattan hotel.
Merkel again argued that since the IMF is deeply involved in
solving the ongoing Eurozone debt crisis it should be led by an
European.
“In the current situation, where we have considerable problems with
the euro — in which the IMF is heavily involved — a lot speaks for the
possibility of presenting a European candidate,” the Chancellor told
reporters here.
Moreover, Strauss-Kahn’s mandate at the head of the IMF was not
over and “the transition takes places during his term,” Merkel noted,
arguing that this is something which could convince emerging economies
to accept a European candidate.
“It is of great importance that we find a swift solution,” she
stressed.
“Naturally, the emerging economies are entitled to fill the
position of the head of the IMF or the World Bank over the medium term,”
the Chancellor conceded.
Earlier today, a senior German lawmaker urged the government to
lobby for a German to succeed Strauss-Kahn.
“I demand from the federal government that it champion for a German
getting to the top of the IMF,” Klaus-Peter Flosbach, the parliamentary
financial speaker of Merkel’s center-right CDU/CSU bloc, told the German
business daily Handelsblatt in an interview published on its website.
–Berlin bureau: +49-30-22 62 05 80; email: twidder@marketnews.com
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