Italy Accuses Germany of Undermining Its Economic Efforts
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Version 0 of 1. ROME — Italy’s prime minister on Friday accused Germany’s central bank of blocking efforts to stimulate regional growth and putting the interests of financiers before citizens in the European Union. Matteo Renzi, a youthful left-leaning politician who became the Italian prime minister in February, has adopted a muscular stance on the European stage since his party won a strong endorsement in elections to the European Parliament in May. Mr. Renzi has called upon the European authorities to put less emphasis on debt and deficit targets, a position that has provoked a public dispute with some prominent Germans. On Friday, Mr. Renzi appeared to relish the chance to deliver a sharp retort to Jens Weidmann, the president of the German central bank, the Bundesbank. Mr. Weidman has long called for fiscal restraint by the most vulnerable euro zone countries, including Italy. “I don’t expect the Bundesbank to talk about Italian politics,” Mr. Renzi said in a news conference in Rome. “We should all bear in mind that Europe belongs to European citizens, not to bankers — neither Italian nor German bankers.” Mr. Renzi did not mention Mr. Weidmann by name. But a day earlier Mr. Weidmann suggested that Mr. Renzi should focus on making the Italian economy more competitive, rather than increasing debt. Italy’s national debt stands at about 130 percent of the country’s gross domestic product, the third-largest such ratio in the developed world, after those of Japan and Greece. Mr. Weidmann’s comments, made to politicians from Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party, were carried widely in the Italian news media on Friday morning. Mr. Weidmann called for “fewer words and more deeds” from Italy. He criticized Mr. Renzi for “announcing” rather than carrying out reforms, according to a report by ANSA, an Italian news agency. Mr. Renzi has a new forum for speaking out, now that Italy is taking its turn in the revolving presidency of the union. While that role is largely ceremonial, rotating every six months among the bloc’s 28 nations, it still gives Mr. Renzi a platform to push the Europe to put less emphasis on austerity than many in Germany, the bloc’s strongest economy, would like. Italy’s term began July 1. Speaking at the same news conference in Rome on Friday, José Manuel Barroso, the departing president of the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, said Mr. Renzi was correct to identify the need to ease austerity policies. But Mr. Barroso suggested that the commission had already shown a sufficient degree of flexibility toward countries like France under the current rule book, and he warned that it would be hazardous to go further. “The worst thing we could now do is to appear that we don’t respect our own rules,” Mr. Barroso said. The danger is that “the markets will start again betting against some of our member states,” said Mr. Barroso, who noted there were serious of “threats against Italy” during the recent European debt crisis. Italian officials say their goal is to buy more time for nations using the euro to meet budget targets when they make painful structural changes in areas like pensions, workers’ rights and health care. That, however, could raise thorny issues for the European Commission, which would have to decide when such changes have been completed and whether they are sufficient to merit leniency. Italy is putting the focus on growth at a time when its economy remains in a precarious state. Analysts say countries including Spain have done far more than Italy to make their economies more internationally competitive in the wake of the European debt crisis. A closely watched purchasing managers’ index for Italy fell to a three-month low in June, according to a report released on Tuesday by Markit, a financial information company. Italian unemployment rose to 12.6 percent in May, compared with 12.1 percent a year earlier, according to Eurostat, the European Union’s statistics agency. |