Obama, EU Leaders Meet amid Euro Crisis
By Merle David Kellerhals Jr.
Staff Writer
Washington - The United States urged European Union officials to move forcefully and decisively in responding to the mounting crisis involving the euro and a potential threat to the world economy.
"We continue to believe that this is a European issue, that Europe has the resources and capacity to deal with it and that they need to act decisively and conclusively to resolve the problem," White House press secretary Jay Carney said at a November 28 press briefing.
President Obama met with European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President José Manuel Barroso at the White House for an annual summit. Much of the discussion focused on the euro crisis and its potential impact on the world economy and the United States. Financial experts and economists have been voicing concerns in Europe and elsewhere about the euro, the European Union's currency, and whether it could collapse.
"A large part of that conversation obviously revolved around the eurozone crisis. And Presidents Van Rompuy and Barroso have been very actively engaged with the heads of government and heads of state in Europe to try to resolve this crisis. I communicated to them that the United States stands ready to do our part to help them resolve this issue," Obama said. "This is of huge importance to our own economy."
"If Europe is contracting, or if Europe is having difficulties, then it's much more difficult for us to create good jobs here at home because we send so many of our products and services to Europe," Obama said at a midafternoon press conference flanked by Van Rompuy and Barroso and the U.S. and European Union flags.
Van Rompuy told reporters that it is no secret that the European Union is going through a difficult period. It is confronted with a confidence crisis aggravated by the slowdown in global economic growth, he said.
"The union has done a lot over the last 18 months, and we have taken decisions that were unthinkable just a year ago in the fields of economic governance, on budgets and imbalances, financial support and final regulation," Van Rompuy said. "All member states of the union are all engaged in policies of fiscal consolidation and strengthening competitiveness via comprehensive reforms."
He said the EU has much more to do to resolve the crisis and is working across three fronts to address the immediate crisis, deal with medium-term debt resolution and establish "a sound perspective for the longer term."
Van Rompuy said he will present a comprehensive road map on December 9 to EU heads of state on how to strengthen the economic union of the euro area commensurate with its monetary union.
"We are aiming for binding rules to ensure strong fiscal and economic discipline in all countries to go hand in hand with fiscal and economic integration, not only discipline but also integration in the euro area as a whole," he said.
Barroso said the world economy has not fully recovered from the 2007-2009 financial crisis and extreme recession. "We face the common challenge of bringing debt under control while relaunching growth and creating new jobs. We all know this is not an easy task," he said.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and senior White House advisers participated in the talks.
Meanwhile, on November 28 the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) announced that the current euro crisis is "a key risk to the world economy."
While the Washington meetings focused extensively on the eurozone debt crisis, the leaders also discussed the "incredible transformation" going on in the Middle East and North Africa, as well as Iran, and how to "make sure we keep putting pressure" on that country to "stand down" on its nuclear weapons development program. They also talked about aviation security and how to support what is taking place in the Middle East and North Africa. On Belarus, they agreed they want the return of the rule of law, and they want reforms to continue in Ukraine.
They also discussed actions by the EU and the Arab League to impose sanctions on Syria.
(This is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State.)
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