The Italian government on
Monday set out its vision for Europe in a nine-page position
paper titled Italy's Strategic Proposal for the Future of the
European Union: Growth, Jobs, and Stability.
The document moots the ideas of transforming the European
Stability Mechanism (ESM) into a "European Monetary Fund", and
gives its backing to the creation of a "eurozone super finance
minister" as proposed by the French and German central banks.
It goes on to call for "a joint, shared policy" to deal
with the ongoing migrant and refugee crisis and for joint
management of external EU borders, both of which could be
financed by issuing EU bonds - an idea Germany has never been
partial to.
The Schengen Agreement "is one of the most important
results achieved" in the process of European integration and
"must be preserved and strengthened", the paper said.
On the economic front, Italy called for any budget leeway
to be "integrally used to support growth" during the current
phase of modest recovery and exceptionally low inflation.
The European Central Bank's monetary expansion policies
have proven "insufficient" to ensure proper economy recovery,
the Italian position paper said.
Accordingly, the EU should promote budget policies that
foster growth, reforms, and job creation.
"Economic union is a multi-dimensional project...which
should go hand in hand with measures for growth and employment,"
the paper said.
"This would prove to citizens that Europe is the solution
not the problem" in the face of a rising tide of populism in
almost every member State, the position paper said.
Renzi said Monday that his criticism of the EU was aimed
at contributing to real change of the bloc and not to win
concessions for Italy.
He also announced he will attend a nuclear summit in
Washington at the end of March after visits to Illinois, Nevada
and Massachusetts, a visit to Tehran in April, and that he has
accepted an invitation from Russian President Vladimir Putin to
attend an economic forum in St Petersburg on June 18.
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