by Calculated Risk on 1/11/2012 12:53:00 PM

A few comments from Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council (translation via Google Translate):

It is a crisis in the € zone. The divergent trends in the € zone are too large. It is not an "optimum currency area"

It's not just government, to "sovereign debt" but also excesses in the financial sector, real estate etc.

We must do everything to avoid recession. ... We need a fiscal strategy that is "growth friendly"

Fiscal consolidation will not tell us to say "no" to all or which is cut everywhere. We must "prioritize"

We ask each member state to establish a "job plan", we make commitments we can evaluate

This is a prelude to the next European Union summit meeting in Brussels on January 30th - the key topic will be a growth agenda.

Maybe even Germany will pay attention to growth now that the German economy appears headed into recession too (no surprise since they export to other EU countries that are already in recession), from the WSJ: German Economy Shrank Slightly at End of 2011

Germany's statistics office said GDP slid around 0.25% in the fourth quarter from the third, ending a two-year expansion.