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Finance ministers meet as eurozone scrambles to avoid collapse

Other News Materials 29 November 2011 20:26 (UTC +04:00)
Eurozone finance ministers were meeting in Brussels on Tuesday in an effort to find fresh ways to calm market speculation, reported dpa.
Finance ministers meet as eurozone scrambles to avoid collapse

Eurozone finance ministers were meeting in Brussels on Tuesday in an effort to find fresh ways to calm market speculation, reported dpa.

Italy is the latest member to be targeted, with rumours that it might soon need a bailout fuelling concerns about a possible break up of the currency bloc.

"It is clear that market doubts are no longer limited to the eurozone's weak souther periphery, but now assail the euro's very survival," Alessandro Leipold, a former International Monetary Fund official and analyst with the Brussels research group The Lisbon Council, wrote on the Italian business daily Il Sole 24 Ore.

The so-called Eurogroup was due to discuss releasing bailout instalments for Greece and Ireland and agree on ways to boost the financial firepower of their rescue fund, the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF).

"We will have a further payment for Greece," Belgium's acting Finance Minister Didier Reynders said before the talks.

Speaking in Berlin on Monday, EFSF chief Klaus Regling said the eurozone would fall short of reaching a 1-trillion-euro (1.3 trillion dollars) target for the fund.

Ministers were also due to examine economic reform and austerity commitments from Italy's new prime minister, Mario Monti - who is also the country's Economy Minister - and discuss German demands to change EU rules to instill greater eurozone budget discipline.

On Wednesday, talks were due to resume among all 27 EU members on plans agreed last month to guarantee banks' liquidity.

Diplomats said options to issue EU-wide guarantees were rejected, with ministers likely to agree only to coordinate their national plans.

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