Estonian government communications unitBrussels, 19 October 2012 – The main topic discussed at the two-day meeting of the European Council, which started on Thursday evening, was strengthening the European economic and monetary union and agreeing on the principles of creating the EU banking union.
The banking union must guarantee that all banks follow the same rules to prevent financial crises and their spread to other countries. Prime Minister Andrus Ansip said that Estonia supports uniform banking supervision by the European Central Bank. According to Ansip it is important for Estonia that the mechanism allows for the inclusion of countries that do not belong to the eurozone.
“We must not weaken the ties between eurozone countries and other countries,” said Ansip. “I support the idea of giving countries that are not in the eurozone equal rights to have a say.”
Ansip explained that Estonia’s cooperation with Nordic and Baltic authorities in the area of financial supervision has been efficient. However, many countries in the region do not belong to the eurozone, and the creation of uniform banking supervision by the European Central Bank must not decrease the quality of existing cooperation and supervision, said the prime minister.
“Almost all of the countries operating on our banking market are not members of the eurozone, which means that maintaining good cooperation with the supervision authorities of these countries is extremely important to Estonia,” emphasised Ansip. “I would be sad if countries outside the eurozone distanced themselves from cooperation despite our desire to include them on an equal basis.”
The prime minister added that the introduction of common supervision should be followed by the creation of a common crisis management and deposit guarantee system.
The heads of state and heads of government of EU Member States also discussed the different aspects of a budgetary, economic and political union. Decisions about further steps to be taken on these issues will be made at the council meeting to be held in December.
Photos of the meeting can be viewed here:
http://valitsus.ee/et/uudised/... 