The president of the European Council says a new treaty will include 17 euro states plus 6 other EU states, but not all 27 EU members, but this still may be blocked by UK.
14.03.2012
(AP) The president of the European Council says a new treaty will include 17 euro states plus 6 other EU states, but not all 27 EU members.
Herman Van Rompuy, President of the European Council, said the countries would provide up to €200 billion in extra resources to the International Monetary fund.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said early Friday he would have preferred a treaty among all the members of the EU, but he could not because of the British position. He said the new accord should be ready by March.
Sarkozy said the British proposed that they be exempted from certain financial regulation. "We could not accept this" because a lack of sufficient regulation caused the current problems, Sarkozy said.
UK threatens eurozone over EU institutions
Britain's prime minister is threatening that he may not allow a group of 23 European Union states that plan to set up their own treaty to use EU institutions.
David Cameron says "The institutions of the European Union belong to the European Union, belong to the 27" member states.
The 17 euro states and six other EU states early Friday agreed to create a new treaty that will allow them to introduce stricter fiscal rules in the hope of containing a worsening debt crisis.
They plan to rely on the European Commission and the European Court of Justice to enforce those rules.
Cameron said it was not in the U.K.'s interest to join the new treaty because he could not get special safeguards for the country's financial centre.