GENOA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th April, 2020) The Eurogroup, an informal body for discussion of shared responsibilities by euro area ministers, may not reach consensus on measures aimed at coping with the economic consequences of the coronavirus pandemic during a meeting on Thursday, experts with Jacques Delors Institute said on Wednesday.
The Eurogroup failed to agree on the issue on Tuesday, and is set to try to bridge differences between northern and southern countries-members of the European Union once again on Thursday.
According to Andreas Eisl and Lucas Gutenberg, experts from the institute, the agreement would not be reached on Thursday, and the EU would require another meeting on a higher level next week in order to overcome differences.
Italy and the Netherlands are strongly opposing each other, experts said, adding that Dutch Finance Minister Wopke Hoekstra was even more reluctant on the issue of the coronabonds � eurobonds that would help economies of the EU countries hit hardest by COVID-19 to recover from the epidemic � than his German counterpart, Olaf Scholz.
Experts tend to agree that Germany and Austria were more flexible than the Netherlands, and Berlin even agreed with Paris that an ambitious agreement should be reached.
According to experts, an idea that Italy could be freed from having to pay its contribution to the European budget ($108 billion) could also be considered, but this would not solve the issue for other countries, like Spain, Greece, Portugal and even France.
