Topic: EU - on June 13, 2012 at 9:57:00 AM CEST
Eurozone crisis live: Focus shifts to Italy ahead of bond auctions
Pressure is building on eurozone's third-largest economy
• German finance minister says "Italy is not in danger" • Today's agenda
8.37am: Echoing Schäuble's comments that Italy is not in danger, the chief economist of the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has also warned against a panic.
Pier Carlo Padoan said in an interview with Italian daily Il Messaggero:
There are no changes to the country's economic fundamentals that can justify an attack on Italy. Among OECD countries, Italy is one of the closest to a stabilisation of its debt. If there wasn't the contagion factor, steps taken so far towards recovery would be the right ones.
8.31am: Italy is not in danger, Germany's finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble has declared in an interview with Italian newspaper La Stampa. He says that Italy won't be the next "contaminated" country. "For Italy, no danger if it follows the path of Mountains," the headline reads. The question is, is he saying that because Germany doesn't want to bail out Italy as well?
Calling on Italian readers to provide a translation of the rest...
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