Eurogroup head Jean-Claude Juncker criticised Germany's slow pace in dealing with the eurozone debt crisis in an interview published in Der Spiegel magazine on Sunday. "The pace of organisation in Berlin is slower than in other capitals," said Juncker, chairman of the euro group of finance ministers and also Luxembourg's prime minister.
He said the German parliament was getting in the way of quicker progress made by the European Union on the eurozone rescue efforts. "The Bundestag can't decide on every little detail in advance because sometimes they are part of last-minute negotiations at (EU) summits," Juncker said.
European Union leaders hold talks on Sunday to try to hammer out a comprehensive plan for tackling the eurozone debt crisis, but a breakthrough is not expected until another summit on Wednesday.
Juncker said he understood that the German parliament wanted to maintain its control over Germany's budget "but that cannot mean that the EU is not able to react with the necessary speed." Guenther Oettinger, an EU Commissioner from Germany, also spoke out in Der Spiegel on delays caused by the German parliament.
"Europe will no longer be able to act sufficiently if there is such a difficult parliamentary process (seen in Germany) in 16 other euro states or in other triple A countries," said Oettinger, a former state premier of Baden-Wuerttemberg and a leader in Chancellor Angela Merkel's conserative party.
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