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David Cameron vows to veto any eurozone bailout treaty

21 May 2010 17:59 (UTC +04:00)

Baku â€“ APA. David Cameron made clear today he would not accept any attempt to force Britain to come to the aid of the eurozone through a new EU treaty, APA reports quoting â€œTimes Onlineâ€.
In a direct and undiplomatic rebuff to Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, Mr Cameron insisted that Britain would not be â€œdrawn furtherâ€ into supporting the currency area.
Mrs Merkel has previously suggested that a new treaty, increasing the EUâ€™s power over member statesâ€™ fiscal policy, might be necessary to prevent another Greek-style eurozone crisis.
Speaking at a joint press conference after his first meeting with the German Chancellor, Mr Cameron said: â€œThere is no question of agreeing to a treaty that transfers power from Westminster to Brussels.
â€œThat is set out 100 per cent clearly in the coalition agreement.
â€œBritain obviously is not in the euro and Britain is not going to be in the euro, and so Britain would not be agreeing to any agreement or treaty that drew us further into supporting the euro area.â€
The Prime Minister stressed that any new European treaty, even one applying only to the eurozone would need unanimous agreement, effectively giving Britain a veto.
Mrs Merkel insisted that a new treat was only option saying: â€œThere are ideas from Germany where treaty changes would play a role, but we say very clearly that weâ€™re just starting this work.â€
Hours before their meeting the German parliament agreed to support a â‚¬750 billion (Â£651.5 billion) eurozone rescue package but the massive stimulus was not enough to calm the markets.
Today the Dow Jones industrial average dropped below 10,000 for the first time since February within minutes of opening, falling 1.32 per cent to 9,936 before rebounding to 10,045.41.
In London, the FTSE 100 dropped by as much as 2.17 per cent to 4,963.94, the first time it has been below 5,000 since October but later rose to 5,024.78.
The relationship between the two leaders has never been warm and Mrs Merkel previously expressed her displeasure after the Conservatives left the European Peopleâ€™s Party, the EU Parliament bloc in which the Chancellorâ€™s Christian Democratic Union sits.
Mrs Merkel was seen to have snubbed Mr Cameron in response when she visited Britain in April. She held talks with Gordon Brown but, unlike Mr Sarkozy, she did not find time to see Mr Cameron.
Mr Cameronâ€™s strong line today will please Eurosceptics in his party but comes only days after Britain was widely seen to have been defeated, mainly by France and Germany, in an EU negotiation over the regulation of hedge funds.
EU finance ministers backed stricter controls on Tuesday despite objections from London, which is home to most of Europeâ€™s hedge funds.