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The new constitution entered into force on 1 January, accompanied by legislation which critics say undermine the independence of the central bank, the judiciary and the media – and entrench the position of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s ruling Fidesz party which is affiliated with the European People’s Party.

Tens of thousands of people protested in Budapest on Monday (2 January) alleging that the new laws are authoritarian.

Commission President José Manuel Barroso and Orbán exchanged a series of letters at the end of December in which Barroso warned the prime minister not to jeopardise the independence of the Bank of Hungary, and re-iterated concerns about media independence.

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For more on him: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_Boc

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“Were the euro area or the European Union to break apart, the costs have been estimated at up to 50% of GDP in an initial phase. It is estimated that Germany’s GDP would contract by 3% and it would lose one million jobs if the euro area were to shrink to a few core member countries,” Barroso said.

The Commission president admitted that the Union needed an overhaul and even changes in its treaties. However, he advocated against a two-speed Europe.

“In the upcoming discussions regarding the deepening of European integration, including through possible changes to the European Union treaties, the Commission will steadfastly uphold its role as guarantor of the interests of the European common good, the general interest of Europe, including of course the interest of all our member states. And we will defend the integrity of the single market and the integrity of the single currency.”

“The EU as a whole and the euro area belong together and should not be divided,” Barroso said.

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Greek Prime Minister Giorgios Papandreou talks to the media in Cannes, France, after meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy on his plan to call for a referendum in Greece on its membership of the eurozone.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel give a joint press conference in Cannes, France, after their crisis meeting with Greek Prime Minister Giorgios Papandreou on his plan to hold a referendum on the the euro rescue package agreed in Brussels on 27 Oct.

Oct. 28 – The chief of the euro zone’s bailout fund, Klaus Regling, arrives in China to meet with officials in an attempt to sell European debt. But he’s warned he doesn’t expect to strike a deal. Reuters’ Kirsty Basset reports.

With only hours to go before one of the most important summits in European history, observers in Brussels believe that the talks will not provide the “comprehensive agreement” initially promised by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
A definitive agreement to rescue the euro may still take days to finalise.

According to Euractiv, diplomats report a lack of progress on the expansion of the EU rescue fund. That slowdown has already caused a last-minute cancellation of a meeting of euro zone finance ministers.

Banking recapitalization also remainsi a troubling issue. EU leaders have agreed that banks need more capital but they still have to say how much and how the banks will get this.
Banks say they could live with a 40% haircut on Greek debt but some EU leaders, including Merkel are pushing for 60 percent.
The same muddle goes for the EFSF. There is still no exact figure for a bigger fund, with figures ranging between 1000 and 2000 billion euro. It remains unclear how that bigger firepower would be achieved.
To boost the fund, EU leaders have two options: an insurance option and an investment option. They can also consider sing a combination of these.
The investment option would raise money from governments and possibly tap investors on capital markets.
Diplomats, talking to EurActiv on condition of anonymity, said creating clarity on the role of this investment option in handling the growing debt problem is the most important part of the talks at the moment.
It’s clear that a comprehensive deal is not in sight yet, but parts of the solution are likely to be made public in the next 24 hours. It remains to be seen if that will renew the confidence in the euro on the international financial markets. Ray Frenken. EUX.tv

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The Dutch, Finnish and German governments and central banks are preparing ‘in secret’ for a Greek default. Dutch Finance Minister Jan-Kees De Jager on Tuesday said in a Dutch television interview that his ministry is preparing ‘in secret’ for a ‘worse-than-worst case scenario’ such a Greek government default. Rating agency Moody’s meanwhile has lower its rating for a number of French banks. EUX.TV’s Raymond Frenken reports in this update with the latest on the euro crisis.

EurActiv Editor Frederic Simon and EUX.TV’s Raymond Frenken discuss the future of the euro in their first-ever live discussion on YouTube.

This discussion also marks the 5th anniversary of EUX.TV. EUX.TV was launched on 13 September 2006 as a online webtv channel discussing European policy news and political developments in Europe.

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Europe’s Soft War on Terror door EUXTV

This documentary is based on interviews conducted between 2007 and 2009 in Madrid, Berlin, London, Brussels and Paris on behalf of Gilles de Kerchove, the European Union’s anti-terror coordinator. It was completed in 2010 and shown to European ministers during a meeting in Brussels. The European Council has used parts of this documentary as footage to illustrate its ‘Preventing Radicalisation’ policy.

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“If we discovered that, you know, space aliens were planning to attack and we needed a massive buildup to counter the space alien threat and really inflation and budget deficits took secondary place to that, this slump would be over in 18 months,” Kruman said. “And then if we discovered, oops, we made a mistake, there aren’t any aliens, we’d be better…”

Krugman made his comments in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS.

But, according to Thursday’s edition of the ARD’s Monitor programme, the finance lobby has managed to keep a lid on this restrictive legislation for the banking sector, drawing on the influence and power of the global bank lobby group The Institute of International Finance, which is led by Deutsche Bank CEO Josef Ackermann.

Ackermann, who was present at the July emergency summit of eurozone governments in Brussels as a special advisor to the European Council, is widely seen as the chief international banking lobbyist. According to Monitor, he engineered a deal at the summit that forced banks to share for ‘only 21 percent’ in the costs of a second Greek rescue package, where the EU initially had wanted the private sector banks to share half of the cost of the second Greek rescue.

After the summit, diplomats handed a copy of the presentation that Ackermann gave to the EU leaders at the summit to several journalists. This allowed EUX.TV to create the following report:

ARD Monitor on Thursday also reported that out of the 260 experts that advise the European Commission and European Parliament on financial regulation, some 200 are from the financial sector. This allows the banks to successfully influence the legislative process in such a way that members of the European parliament are encouraged to copy the banks’ proposals into EU legislation that the parliament votes on.

To watch ARD’s Monitor, click here..

The programme on Thursday showed two concrete examples of bank proposals that have been adopted by the parliament.

For English-language copies of the EU legislation involved, click here, and here.

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In an interview with the Dutch financial daily Het Financieele Dagblad, Kok said that it is unavoidable that the coordination of financial and economic policy of euro countries will increasingly shift towards Brussels.

Related: Wim Kok talks to The Lisbon Council’s Ann Mettler:

Kok emphasized that there should be a discussion “without taboos” about a larger European financial emergency fund. He said an “open debate” is necessary on the conditions that need to be met if Eurozone countries at some stage in the future will consider issuing euro-bonds.

“There is no more room for error,” said Kok, addressing European economic policy.

“When discussing Eurobonds, it’s obvious that introducing them will only be considered at a later stage, once conditions have been met that ensure financial discipline is written in capitals in every capital,” Kok said.

“In that spirit Eurobonds should be discussed, not from ‘we’re against’ or ‘we’re in favor’,” he said. “It’s about the ‘how’ and under which conditions such a bond can serve the purpose of ensuring stability for the euro. ‘Yes, if’ is more efficient than saying ‘no’. It can even help contain the crisis.”

Kok was prime minister of the Netherlands when the Dutch helped engineer the construction of the euro during 1991 with the Treaty of Maastricht. Between April and November 200 Kok headed up a review of the EU’s Lisbon Strategy competitiveness program and presented a report on the Lisbon strategy concluding that even if some progress was made, most of the goals were not achieved.

‘Europe causes Dutch coalition tension’

Addressing the domestic power balance in the Dutch political scene, Kok said that recent discussions over Europe and the euro are creating increased tension between cabinet and its ‘supporting partner’, Geert Wilders’ PVV Freedom Party. The Dutch cabinet is built on a coalition between Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s liberal VVD party and the christian-democrat party CDA. It draws a majority in parliament only because of PVV support.