ATHENS, Greece — European leaders insist they want to keep Greece in the eurozone, but are putting off any agreement on how they hope to accomplish that. Greece says it, too, wants to stay in the eurozone, but until after elections it’s uncertain whether it can implement the austerity that Europe has set as a condition for doing so.
WASHINGTON — On paper at least, European leaders agree: They need stronger growth measures to help their economies expand out of their 2 ½-year-old government debt crisis. Figuring out exactly what those new steps might be will be the hard part.
BEIRUT — Gunmen fired rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns early Monday in intense street battles in the Lebanese capital, wounding six people as fears mounted that the conflict in neighboring Syria was bleeding across the border.
ATHENS, Greece — Critical talks to form a governing coalition in crisis-struck Greece foundered once more, leading the country one step closer to new elections — and bringing its continued presence in the euro into serious doubt.
WASHINGTON — The elections that drove Nicolas Sarkozy out of power in France and left Greece scrambling to build a coalition government pose a financial threat to the United States that could undermine President Barack Obama’s efforts to cast himself as the agent of a U.S. economic revival.
Late last week and over the weekend, a flurry of developments related to the near and longer term economic outlook took place, most of which could be a cause for concern.
PARIS — France handed the presidency Sunday to leftist Francois Hollande, a champion of government stimulus programs who says the state should protect the downtrodden — a victory that could deal a death blow to the drive for austerity that has been the hallmark of Europe in recent years.
Europe is economically big — very big. The 17 nation euro-zone is approximately equal to the size of the U.S. economy (depending upon how valuations are calculated in terms of currency conversions), and the more comprehensive 27 nation European Union (EU) is even bigger still. Given the tremendous economic interdependencies among countries of the world, when an economy as large as either of the above entities begins to experience significant economic problems, it is just a matter of time until those difficulties will be transmitted to the rest of the world.