European Union (EU) leaders threw their support Thursday behind a concerted action plan adopted by eurozone members to fight the current global financial crisis.
"On the financial crisis, I can confirm with you all the information that we have given you. That was a subject of unanimity," French President Nicolas Sarkozy, whose country holds the EU rotating presidency, told reporters after a two-day summit with other EU leaders.
In joint conclusions of the summit, which focused on the financial crisis, EU leaders welcomed the concerted action plan of the eurozone countries.
Leaders from the 15 EU countries that share the euro hammered out an action plan in a joint response to the unfolding financial crisis at their first ever summit Sunday in Paris.
Among those measures, eurozone governments would, acting on a national basis, buy into banks to boost their finances and temporarily guarantee bank refinancing to ease the credit crunch, which was modeled after the British bailout package.
In line with the action plan, several eurozone countries, led by Germany and France, launched their most united defense so far against the financial crisis Monday, pledging more than one trillion euros (1.35 trillion U.S. dollars) to save troubled banks.
Britain also joined the move by injecting billions of pounds into the country's three major banks.
All of the 27 EU leaders welcomed the measures adopted by member states in conformity with the principles of the plan and called on them to ensure that their future national measures also respect those principles and to take account of the possible effect of their decisions on others.
The leaders pledged to take necessary measures to preserve the stability of the financial system, support the major financial institutions, avoid bankruptcies and protect savers' deposits.
The European Commission proposed Wednesday to temporarily raise the minimum guarantee that EU member states must offer on savers' deposits.
Under the proposal, the minimum level of coverage for deposits in all EU countries will be increased within one year from 20,000 euros (27,000 dollars) to 100,000 euros (135,000 dollars), and initially to 50,000 euros (67,500 dollars) in the intervening period.
Individual member states can choose to add to these minimum levels. In addition, the payout period in the event of bank failure will be reduced from three months to three days.
The commission said the new rules were designed to improve depositor protection and maintain the confidence of depositors amid the financial crisis.
In a bid to enable speedy and effective action to be taken in a crisis situation, EU leaders decided to establish an informal warning, information-exchange and evaluation mechanism, called "financial crisis cell."
The cell would bring together representatives of the EU presidency, the president of the commission, the president of the European Central Bank (ECB) and the president of the Euro group.
The leaders also stressed the need to strengthen the supervision of the European financial sector, particularly cross-border groups, with a view to developing a coordinated supervision system at European level.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said central bankers from EU countries would hold monthly meetings as part of plans to improve the supervision of European financial systems.
"We have ... jointly agreed that the central bank heads of the European Union member states meet once a month and that will pave the way for more European supervision," Merkel said.
The commission is preparing legislative proposals to strengthen the rules on rating agencies and bring down fat executive pay in financial institutions to avoid excessive risk taking.
The EU decided Wednesday to ease its accounting rules to help its banks and financial institutions better cope with the financial crisis.
Under the changes, financial institutions in the EU would no longer have to reflect market fluctuations in their financial statements for those toxic assets which were at the root of the financial crisis as from the third quarter of 2008.
Source: Xinhua
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