Post date: Oct 29, 2010 12:58:31 PM
European Union leaders agreed in principle to back limited changes to the bloc's main treaty to shore up Europe's defences against any new financial crises as EU's foreign policy chief says Iran is prepared to hold talks on its nuclear programme with the six major powers.
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (OCTOBER 29, 2010) REUTERS - EU leaders decided to support calls by Germany and France for limited changes to the bloc's main treaty on Thursday night (October 28-29). The amendments will help shore up Europe's defences against any new financial crises.
EU leaders agreed that changes were needed to create a permanent system to handle sovereign debt problems and endorsed tougher budget rules, including sanctions on states that do not keep deficits and debt in check at a summit in Brussels.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the euro will be strengthened.
"We are about to enter the last session but we can already say that the euro will be strengthened, firstly through the strengthening of the Stability and Growth Pact and the possible resulting sanctions that will happen quasi-automatically,'' Merkel said.
But Berlin failed to win widespread support for demands to suspend the voting rights of member states which breach the rules. This would have required more radical treaty change and has been postponed until after the other measures are enforced. A move that was welcomed by Luxembourg prime minister and Eurogroup president Jean-Claude Juncker amongst others.
"I am very satisfied that the issue of voting rights is not on the table anymore but has moved further away and that Mr. Van Rompuy is now in charge of clarifying. The wording of the (Council) conclusions will show that there is no agreement on this," Juncker said to journalists.
The leaders asked Herman Van Rompuy, the president of the EU Council grouping national governments, to prepare changes to the Lisbon treaty in time for agreement at a summit in December.
Any change to an EU treaty must be approved unanimously and ratified by all member states, either in a vote of parliament or via a referendum. The European Parliament should also agree.
EU leaders also discussed EU's budget for 2011.
British Prime Minister David Cameron won support from France, Germany and others at a European Union summit on Thursday (October 28) for his opposition against a planned 5.9 percent increase in the EU's budget for 2011.
The increase in the budget to 130.1 billion euros ($180.6 billion) was approved by the European Parliament in the previous week, prompting protests from some of the EU's 27 governments. They argued that spending must not grow so much at a time of austerity. Most EU governments had agreed that next year's budget should increase by 2.9 percent.
Separately, the EU's foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton announced that Iran is prepared to hold talks on its nuclear programme with the six major powers any time from mid-November.
Ashton said she had received a letter from Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, Saed Jalili, in which he agreed to meet "in a place and on a date convenient to both sides" after November 10.
Ashton had invited Jalili to hold three days of talks in Vienna from Nov. 15-17 earlier this month (October).
''He is agreeable to beginning discussions after the 10th of November and wants to agree a time and place. I think this is a very significant move and we are now in touch with Iran this morning to see whether we can agree the time and the place as quickly as possible,'' Ashton said referring to Jalili.
If a date is agreed for talks, it would be the first high-level meeting to discuss Iran's disputed uranium-enrichment programme in more than a year. The six negotiating powers -- the United States, Russia, Britain, France, China and Germany -- last sat down with Iran in October 2009.
Since those talks broke up, the United Nations, the U.S. and the EU have imposed new sanctions on Iran to put pressure on it to return to negotiations. Iran has dismissed the impact of the strict new measures.
The U.S. and EU believe Iran's nuclear energy programme could potentially produce nuclear weapons. Iran has rejected such suggestions and says it is a civil programme for peaceful energy purposes.