BERLIN (MNI) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday made clear
that she will not give in to any calls for joint liabilities at the
upcoming EU summit this week.
“I say it very frankly: if I think about the summit on Thursday
then I’m worried that there again will be way too much discussion about
all sorts of ideas for joint liability,” Merkel said in a speech at a
conference on sustainability here. “There is talk about eurobonds, about
eurobills, about joint deposit insurance with joint liability and much
more.”
The chancellor reiterated that all such
plans would violate the
German constitution. “Moreover, I take them for economically wrong and
counterproductive,” she said.
“Liability and control must be in balance,” Merkel reasoned. “The
goal must be, thus, a political union.”
German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told German ZDF public
television on Sunday “money alone or bailouts or any other solutions, or
monetary policy at the ECB — that will never resolve the problem.”
Rather, the root causes of the debt crisis needed to be dealt with, he
said.
Merkel insisted today that “in order to win back credibility and
trust…we need a joint commitment to budget discipline and also to
structural reforms for more competitiveness.” Fiscal consolidation and
economic growth are no contradictions, she reasoned
–Berlin bureau: +49-30-22 62 05 80; email: twidder@marketnews.com
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