**The European Commission has confirmed that it may set up a version of the International Monetary Fund to bolster the eurozone’s financial stability.**Germany and France are leading the move, part of a series of initiatives aimed at avoiding a repeat of the sort of financial crisis engulfing Greece.
The IMF monitors the economic policies of member countries and can provide financial aid in the event of a crisis.
France and Germany have resisted IMF involvement in Greece’s financial woes.
BBC economics correspondent Andrew Walker said: "Support for a European Monetary Fund (EMF) seems to have been prompted by the Greek financial crisis, though it could not be up and running anything like soon enough to deal with that problem.
"It is more about dealing with, or preferably preventing, the next crisis within the euro area.
“Things are happening quickly”
Amadeu Altafaj Tardio, European Commission spokesman
“The willingness to create a new agency reflects the aversion that euro governments have to the idea of IMF involvement in the Greek crisis. They do not like the implication that they can’t sort out their own problems themselves.”
The German finance minister, Wolfgang Schauble, said at the weekend that “for the internal stability of the eurozone, we need an institution that has the experience and power of the IMF”.
Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn will inform the full commission executive on Tuesday about the talks on the EMF plan, said his spokesman, Amadeu Altafaj Tardio.
Mr Tardio also said that things were “happening quickly”.
“We are in discussion with the countries of the eurozone,” he said.
Full details of the EMF, and how the 16 members of the eurozone would fund it, might be ready by early June, he said.
Greek crisis
Weighed down by a deficit more than four times the EU’s limit, Greece has initiated a number of austerity measures, including sweeping tax rises and deep cuts in public spending.
The emergency action has sparked protests and nationwide strikes that have affected air and ground transport, as well as schools and hospitals.
It has also highlighted differences in the 27-nation EU between the euro countries and those that have retained their own national currencies.
Countries outside the euro have greater leeway in managing their finances as they can devalue their money if they so wish to help balance their books.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy met the Greek Prime Minister, George Papandreou, at the Elysee Palace on Sunday to discuss Greece’s austerity package.
The meeting came amid growing belief that France and Germany will provide some sort of financial guarantee for the Greek economy.