"European leaders set back bail-out fund overhaul," headlines the FT. The euro’s €440bn mechanism would be given a much greater lending power to tackle the zone’s debt crisis, the paper says. While a draft proposal seen by the paper includes allowing the fund to buy bonds on the open market, concrete plans will be not be ready until next month. Up until now Germany – which would have to foot the largest part of the bill – appeared unwilling to buy government bonds in order to shore up its debt-hit partners, the paper says. Co-ordination between the 17 eurozone countries on tax, pension and debt laws is mentioned by the proposal but the draft does not commit any members to the "pact of competitiveness" advocated my Angela Merkel, adds the FT.
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The leader of Greece’s leftist alliance SYRIZA is the new bright hope of Greek politics. Steering a course between pragmatism and the rhetoric of class warfare, he has unsettled Berlin, and not just those who back Angela Merkel's austerity policies.
Europe’s economic woes have forced us to try to understand the secret Olympian world of global finance. But now that we pay more attention to bond yields and stability mechanisms, isn’t it clear that the experts up on their lofty peaks don’t know what’s going on either?
This year’s Eurovision Song Contest is hosted by Azerbaijan, a country that is far from being a model democracy. An Estonian journalist takes a critical look at the deferential treatment enjoyed by the regime in Baku.