The euro yesterday fell strongly against the US dollar after Italy's welfare minister Roberto Maroni said his country should consider temporary readoption of the lira.
The single European currency dropped to US$1.2220 in early European trading, from US$1.2309 just before dealers began reacting to Maroni's comments in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica. The euro later stood at US$1.2266.
Maroni is a member of Italy's xenophobic Northern League party, which is part of Italy's ruling coalition headed by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
Maroni told La Repubblica that the introduction of the euro had not been an adequate measure to tackle an economic slowdown and a decline in competitiveness in Italy.
It would therefore be "better" to temporarily have a dual circulation of the euro and the lira in Italy, he said.
The euro has suffered badly this week, sinking to US$1.2160 on Wednesday -- the lowest level since Sept. 20 -- in the wake of French and Dutch voters' rejection of the draft EU constitution.
Maroni, a member of the euro-skeptical Northern League party, said the euro "has proved inadequate in the face of the economic slowdown, the loss of competitiveness and the job crisis."
He also said European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet was one of those chiefly responsible for the "disaster of the euro."
In this situation, the answer is to give the government greater power to defend national industry from foreign competition and "to give control over the exchange rate back to the government," he said.
CROSS-STRAIT COLLABORATION: The new KMT chairwoman expressed interest in meeting the Chinese president from the start, but she’ll have to pay to get in Beijing allegedly agreed to let Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) around the Lunar New Year holiday next year on three conditions, including that the KMT block Taiwan’s arms purchases, a source said yesterday. Cheng has expressed interest in meeting Xi since she won the KMT’s chairmanship election in October. A source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a consensus on a meeting was allegedly reached after two KMT vice chairmen visited China’s Taiwan Affairs Office Director Song Tao (宋濤) in China last month. Beijing allegedly gave the KMT three conditions it had to
‘BALANCE OF POWER’: Hegseth said that the US did not want to ‘strangle’ China, but to ensure that none of Washington’s allies would be vulnerable to military aggression Washington has no intention of changing the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said on Saturday, adding that one of the US military’s main priorities is to deter China “through strength, not through confrontation.” Speaking at the annual Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California, Hegseth outlined the US Department of Defense’s priorities under US President Donald Trump. “First, defending the US homeland and our hemisphere. Second, deterring China through strength, not confrontation. Third, increased burden sharing for us, allies and partners. And fourth, supercharging the US defense industrial base,” he said. US-China relations under
The Chien Feng IV (勁蜂, Mighty Hornet) loitering munition is on track to enter flight tests next month in connection with potential adoption by Taiwanese and US armed forces, a government source said yesterday. The kamikaze drone, which boasts a range of 1,000km, debuted at the Taipei Aerospace and Defense Technology Exhibition in September, the official said on condition of anonymity. The Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology and US-based Kratos Defense jointly developed the platform by leveraging the engine and airframe of the latter’s MQM-178 Firejet target drone, they said. The uncrewed aerial vehicle is designed to utilize an artificial intelligence computer
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday decided to shelve proposed legislation that would give elected officials full control over their stipends, saying it would wait for a consensus to be reached before acting. KMT Legislator Chen Yu-jen (陳玉珍) last week proposed amendments to the Organic Act of the Legislative Yuan (立法院組織法) and the Regulations on Allowances for Elected Representatives and Subsidies for Village Chiefs (地方民意代表費用支給及村里長事務補助費補助條例), which would give legislators and councilors the freedom to use their allowances without providing invoices for reimbursement. The proposal immediately drew criticism, amid reports that several legislators face possible charges of embezzling fees intended to pay
RSS