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TAOISEACH ENDA KENNY travels to Brussels today for an EU leaders summit, but the prospect of developing a grand plan to tackle the eurozone debt crisis appears in doubt.
European leaders have agreed the broad strokes of the measures necessary to contain the Greek crisis and guard against future uncertainties. These include boosting the power of the European Financial Stability Fund and writing down some Greek debt.
However, tensions remain between national governments on the details after a previous meeting on Sunday – at which it was hoped that the plan could be finalised today. Points of contention include the extent of the debt write-down, and the mechanism by which the EFSF can be strengthened.
Dutch finance minister Jan Kees de Jager said yesterday that the summit may not reach final agreement and had been unduly hyped as decisive, CNBC reports. A meeting of EU finance ministers was called off this morning, apparently to give officials more time.
Italy is seen as a key problem to address. The government of Silvio Berlusconi was publicly dressed down at Sunday’s talks, with German chancellor Angela Merkel calling on Italy to “live up to its responsibilities” by implementing tougher austerity measures.
Berlusconi’s government yesterday said it had reached a deal on controversial reforms, but it is not clear whether these will be accepted by EU leaders. The BBC reports that his coalition partner Umberto Bossi said “In the end we have found a way. Now we will see what the EU say.”
Analysts’s hopes were muted on the potential for a comprehensive deal yesterday. Former IMF official Domenico Lombardi told Bloomberg: “Europe is finally moving in the right direction but there is a sense that the remedies will fall short of the shock and awe response that is required to stabilize market expectations”.
- Additional reporting by Susan Ryan
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The Westin tried to sell me a weekend of digital detox, when it came to the money I told them where to go. Sure I could buy an iPad for the money they were asking for.
Every device has a built in detox button – the off switch
Delphi mountain resort is a good place to avoid the dreaded signal
Amazing how as a species we just get addicted to anything.
Sent from my iPhone
Watching Netflix on my iPad
Face timing on my Mac
I just went the past week without my iPhone as it had to be repaired. I thought I would be lost but in actual fact I loved not having it! It was a great break not checking it every few mins for messages and Facebook comments etc had no one bothering me and anyone who wanted me or who I wanted I had to talk to face to face. Got a bit more sleep too :P Think I’ll be turning it off now more often now!
If you turn it off completely we’ll never know how this story pans out. Sound for being selfish!
I was in hospital recently and logged out of the business email and Facebook, tough going to do it at first but I thoroughly enjoyed it! Found it quite hard to get back to normal though, I started to get used to not answering emails at stupid o’clock just because they were there. It’s tough going when it’s your own business but I decided I definitely need to start operating office hours for taking calls and responding to emails. There has to be a limit!
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