BERLIN: German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble warned Tuesday that turmoil in Ukraine could threaten Berlin's bid to produce a balanced budget next year.
Schaeuble said he "cannot give a guarantee" that Germany would not spend more than its revenue intake in its budget next year, as he forecasted in March.
"No one knows, for example, how things will go in Ukraine," he told the daily Bild.
But "the odds are good" for a balanced budget "and we will do everything we can to make sure that happens," said Schaeuble, who has held the strings of Germany's public purse since 2009.
Germany, like much of the rest of the European Union, is heavily dependent on Russian energy and gas, but has threatened to impose economic sanctions on Moscow if it further violates Ukraine's borders following its annexation of the Crimean peninsula last month.
Schaeuble presented plans to parliament on Tuesday to achieve a consistently balanced budget from 2015, the first time since 1969.
Europe's top economy will run up only a small public deficit of 6.5 billion euros ($8.9 billion) in 2014 -- its smallest in 40 years -- down from 22.1 billion euros in 2013.
He told deputies that balanced budgets must become "the new norm" for Germany.
"Otherwise the weight of our debt, which is very large, will become unbearable," he said, noting that Germany's debt has swelled to more than 2.0 trillion euros.
"We will not create confidence in Europe if we keep violating the rules," he said, referring to EU fiscal guidelines.
The comments came a week after the new finance minister in neighbouring France, Michel Sapin, said he would discuss the "pace" of deficit reduction during talks with EU partners -- seen as a sign that Paris wants more time to cut spending amid a prolonged economic downturn.
Sapin met with Schaeuble in Berlin Monday but both said they had sidestepped the thorny issue of France's public finances during their talks.
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