‘Scrupulous guard of our rules’

On Thursday, members of the European Parliament quizzed former French Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici a day after France had announced that it would continue to break EU deficit rules until 2017.

The 17th potential commissioner to be quizzed by the parliament this week, Moscovici, who left his post in French government in April, said that under his watch as EU economic affairs commissioner, all countries big and small, "including France," would receive equal treatment. He pledged to be the "scrupulous guard of our rules."

"As commissioner, I will defend the rules, all the rules and as with all rules there is the past and the future," Moscovici said Thursday. "And for the future, my compass will be simple: rules and only the rules, all of them."

The parliament votes on the executive body's makeup on October 22. The new European Commission, taking over in November, needs parliamentary approval, but lawmakers cannot veto specific candidates. The commission proposes laws to parliament and implements those passed by the legislature.

'Show particular severity'

Last month, the European Union's incoming executive chief, Jean-Claude Juncker, nominated Moscovici and a host of other officials. The former French finance minister seeks to take over from the financially orthodox Olli Rehn, the defender of tight budgets who enjoyed the backing of Germany - quite the opposite reception Moscovici has received from officials in Berlin.

Europe's right wing believes that a Socialist with Moscovici's track record has no business in such a post. Before the hearing, Alain Lamassoure, a member of the European Parliament from France's right-wing Union for a Popular Movement, said that Moscovici would "suffer badly" in the job, "because to gain credibility he will have to show particular severity with his country of origin."

However, Moscovici said he had done just that, cutting deficits in France over his two-year term, even though public spending stayed significantly above the EU limit of 3 percent of gross domestic product.

"When I arrived, the deficit was headed towards 5.5 percent, and in my last budget as minister, it was down to 4.1 percent," Moscovici said on Thursday.

mkg/kms (AFP, dpa, AP)