December 2, 2011
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Friday delivered a speech outlining her vision for the course Europe must chart to escape the ongoing sovereign debt crisis. The EU, she said, needs strict new rules to ensure budgetary discipline across the Continent. But it will take time to overcome the crisis, she warned.
Patience. That is the primary message that Chancellor Angela Merkel sought to deliver to the German parliament in a keynote speech on Friday in preparation for next week's European Union summit in Brussels. When it comes to the euro crisis, she said, "there is no immediate solution, there are no quick and easy answers." The chancellor added that "resolving the sovereign debt crisis is a process and this process will take years."
Berlin, she made clear, is focused on changing European treaties to increase the stability of the common currency zone. In particular, she said that her government would push for the introduction of a "European debt brake" -- strict regulations governing the amount of debt euro-zone countries can take on.
"In order to win back trust, we need to do more. Whereas today we have agreements, in the future we need to have legally binding regulations," she said. Merkel is seeking to introduce automatic sanctions should countries violate strict budget rules. She also said that the European Court of Justice should have jurisdiction.
Merkel's speech comes ahead of a meeting planned for Monday with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, at which the two plan to present a clear vision of the changes to European Union regulations they believe will chart a course out of the crisis. Merkel on Friday said that, while she hopes the changes can be agreed to by all 27 EU countries, if necessary she would be in favor of agreement among the 17 euro-zone member states instead.
"We aren't just talking about a fiscal union," she said. "Rather we have begun creating one."
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