The eurozone's fiscal compact is non-negotiable, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Friday in a riposte to French presidential front-runner Francois Hollande, dpa reported. The compact, which was settled this year, commits 25 of 27 European Union governments to reduce borrowing and cut spending. "The fiscal compact has been negotiated. It was signed by 25 government leaders and had already been ratified by Portugal and Greec. Parliaments all over Europe are on the point of adopting it," Merkel told the Westdeutsche Allgemeine newspaper. "It is not able to be newly negotiated," she said, when asked what would happen if Hollande became president. Hollande, forecast by polls to win the French presidency, has said he will seek a renegotiation and more government spending to stimulate growth, setting up a struggle between the EU's heavyweights. Merkel insisted that her government was not neglecting growth in Berlin's drive to clean up public finances. Growth was "the second pillar of our policies," she said. Merkel said she would be able to work either with incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy or with Hollande after the poll, but justified her support for Sarkozy. "We belong to the same family of parties. Besides, we have worked together in trust for the sake of Europe during a very difficult phase of the debt crisis," she said.
