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EU moves closer to deeper integration

European Union leaders will ask the bloc’s top four officials to develop the building blocks they have identified so far into a detailed, time-bound roadmap to a genuine economic and monetary union, draft conclusions of the EU leaders’ summit showed.

European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, Eurogroup President Jean-Claude Juncker and European Central Bank President Mario Draghi prepared a report for the leaders on how to complete the economic union, which would lead to joint debt issuance.

“The report ‘Towards a Genuine Economic and Monetary Union’... sets out the four essential building blocks for the future EMU: an integrated financial framework, an integrated budgetary framework, an integrated economic policy framework and strengthened democratic legitimacy and accountability,” the draft conclusions for the summit said.

“As a follow-up, the president of the European Council is invited to develop, in close collaboration with the president of the Commission, the president of the Eurogroup and the president of the ECB, a specific and time-bound roadmap for the achievement of a genuine Economic and Monetary Union (EMU),” the draft said.

The leaders expect an interim report in October and a final report before the end of the year.

A banking union — to be part of the integration process — should be designed for all 27 countries in the European Union, but allow for differences between those in the 17-member eurozone and those outside.

“Existing legislative proposals on bank resolution and deposit guarantees should be adopted before the end of the year,” said the draft conclusions, to be adopted by the leaders on Friday.

“Building on these, the Commission will submit before the end of 2012 further legislative proposals on a single European banking supervision system covering all banks, a European deposit guarantee scheme and a European bank resolution scheme,” it said. —