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French President Nicolas Sarkozy, left, smiles as he greets German Chancellor Angela Merkel prior to their meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Monday Dec. 5, 2011 Remy de la Mauvinere/AP/Press Association Images
Eurozone
Merkozy: Europe needs a 'tougher' treaty
The leaders of France and Germany say that a new, “tougher” European treaty needed to be agreed upon by March of next year.
THE LEADERS OF France and Germany have said this afternoon that Europe needs a revised, “tougher” treaty to ensure that the current debt crisis never happens again.
France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy and Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel released a statement after their meeting in Paris earlier today, where they discussed potential EU treaty changes to increase fiscal coordination across the eurozone.
They concluded that a new European treaty needed to be agreed upon by March 2012, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Merkel and Sarkozy said that eurozone member states ought to be forced to undergo more thorough evaluations of their budgets and face sanctions if they run up deficits, reports the BBC. Ideally, all 27 states of the European Union would be subject to the new treaty, Merkel said, but if that were not possible then it would at least apply to the 17 eurozone members.
On Friday, the French and German leaders will present their proposals at a crucial summit of EU ministers, which will focus on how to bring the fiscal union out of its current crisis.
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Read: ‘Merkozy’ meet to plan stronger fiscal coordination across eurozone>
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