Obama Presses EU Leaders on Resolving European Debt Crisis
President Barack Obama is pressing European Union leaders to keep moving quickly to resolve the two-year-old euro-zone debt crisis before it hobbles the global economy.
Obama began a White House summit this morning with European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso and foreign-affairs chief Catherine Ashton.
Iran’s nuclear program, strengthening exports and investments, Middle East peace prospects, terrorism and cyber crime also are on the agenda for annual meeting.
The president’s message is that “Europe needs to take decisive action, conclusive action, and it has the capacity to do so,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said.
The summit comes as European finance chiefs are set to meet this week to discuss a rescue plan, and days ahead of a Dec. 2 report by the U.S. Labor Department on the nation’s unemployment rate for November. The rate for October was 9.0 percent.
About $4.6 trillion was wiped from the value of global equities this month on mounting concern that Europe’s debt crisis is spreading.