President of the Slovak Republic Ivan Gašparovič received President of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy in the Presidential Palace.

The two presidents discussed the future of the European Union and the eurozone. Ivan Gašparovič assured his guest that the new Slovak government would to everything to ensure the survival of the European Union and the eurozone projects. The Slovak Republic plans to reduce its general government deficit below 3% of GDP by 2013. “It won’t be easy, but the government is strongly committed to taking all the necessary measures in order to consolidate the public finance,” Ivan Gašparovič said.

The Slovak President also emphasised that the commitment to consolidate the public budget is one of the main priorities pursued by the Slovak government. This will in practice require the adoption of a consolidation package of austerity measures which should raise additional EUR 1.5 billion for the general government budget. Among other things, the consolidation package relies on the increased effectiveness in tax collection and more stringent sanctions for violations of tax obligations, introduction of a special bank levy, as well as a higher corporate income tax to be imposed on legal persons regulated by the state.

Herman Van Rompuy and Ivan Gašparovič also discussed the current situation in Greece and the future development in the eurozone over the upcoming months. In this respect, Herman Van Rompuy said: “The problems in Spain and Cyprus would have been less serious if we were not troubled by Greece.” In his opinion, the Union have to stop this “contamination” spreading from Greece. “Our objective is to keep Greece in the eurozone, but they have to comply with all the conditions and rules,” Van Rompuy said. In his opinion, we will now better after the upcoming Greek election in which the Union will not interfere.