The leaders of European Union member states will discuss the terms of the Stability and Growth Pact at the EU summit in March 2005 during Luxembourg's term as EU president, a spokesman for Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said.
Balkenende, who currently heads the EU presidency, called his Luxembourg counterpart Jean-Claude Juncker, who will take over the presidency on January 1, 2005, on Tuesday to discuss talks on the stability pact in March, spokesman Han Tonnon told AFP. The leaders of the EU member states will meet in Brussels on March 23 for a summit.
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi had asked the EU presidency Tuesday for a meeting to renegotiate the pact. "The Prime Minister felt it was time to get some clarity on the issue so he
called Juncker to discuss it," he said.
There were some rumours that the stability pact would be on the agenda for the December 17 EU summit in Brussels, still during the Dutch EU presidency which is why Balkenende called to talk with Juncker on the issue, the spokesman said.
Italy asked for a renegotiation because it is one of several eurozone states at risk of breaching the stability pact's public deficit limit of three percent of gross domestic product (GDP) next year.
Berlusconi is facing problems reconciling Italy's EU obligations with a campaign pledge to cut taxes, and his poll ratings have plummeted. In addition to the deficit ceiling, the stability pact binds eurozone members to maintaining total public debt below 60 percent of GDP.
By: N. Peter Kramer
