BRUSSELS (Reuters) – France called on Monday for coordinated action by the world’s major economies to counter the strength of the euro and avoid damaging an economic recovery, but Europe’s finance ministers said it was up to markets to decide the currency’s value.

French President Francois Hollande last week raised the possibility of political interference in exchange rate policy when he called for a medium-term target for the euro’s value, a move to counter its recent appreciation.

BRUSSELS, Feb 11 (Reuters) – France insisted on Monday that
euro zone finance officials should discuss the rising strength
of the euro, but several ministers played down the issue and the
G7 was expected to call for “market-determined” exchange rates.

French President Francois Hollande last week raised the
possibility of political interference in exchange rate policy
when he called for a medium-term target for the euro’s value, a
move to counter its recent appreciation.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – A small passenger plane crashed at Belgium’s Charleroi airport on Saturday, killing five people and closing the international hub used by Ryanair for six hours just as thousands of people were due to go away on holiday.

The aircraft, a Cessna, had problems on takeoff and tried to return to Charleroi to make an emergency landing but crashed on the side of the runway, airport officials said.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – A small passenger plane crashed at Belgium’s Charleroi airport on Saturday, killing five people and closing the international hub used by Ryanair for six hours just as thousands of people were due to go away on holiday.

The aircraft, a Cessna, had problems on takeoff and tried to return to Charleroi to make an emergency landing but crashed on the side of the runway, airport officials said.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Europe’s leaders will agree on Friday to push for a free-trade pact with the United States, according to a draft joint statement, putting the onus on the White House to respond to a proposal that would encompass half the world’s economic output.

Major exporters Germany and Britain appear to have won support from the rest of the European Union at a summit in Brussels to reach a deal with Washington that many leaders hope will help Europe pull out of its banking and debt crises.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Efforts to agree a U.S.-EU trade pact could spur the rest of the world to revive global talks for fear of being sidelined in the emerging shape of global commerce, Indonesia’s candidate to head the World Trade Organisation said.

The United States and the European Union are expected to launch negotiations this year towards a free-trade deal that would encompass a third of global trade. That would give Washington and Brussels the potential to set rules on issues ranging from investment to the environment when countries do business.

BRUSSELS, Feb 4 (Reuters) – The European Union dropped its
ban on some U.S. meat imports on Monday in a gesture aimed at
starting talks on a free-trade pact that would encompass about
half the world’s economic output.

Brussels and Washington want to deepen a relationship that
accounts for a third of global trade, and ending the EU import
ban on live pigs and beef washed in lactic acid is meant to show
the Europeans are serious about a deal.

BRUSSELS, Feb 1 (Reuters) – Euro zone inflation fell more
than expected in January in a sign that companies were cutting
prices to entice shoppers at a time when joblessness remained at
a record level at the end of 2012.

The rate of consumer price inflation in the 17 countries
using the euro fell to 2 percent in January compared to a year
ago, the EU’s statistics office Eurostat said on Friday.

BRUSSELS, Jan 31 (Reuters) – Residential property prices in
Ireland have tumbled by 50 percent since their peak in late
2007, while Spain’s real estate values have fallen by almost a
third, the EU’s statistics office Eurostat said on Thursday.

The data, which has been released by Eurostat for the first
time, shows the extent of the property crash that followed the
global financial crisis from 2008 and propelled the euro zone
into its own debt crisis that nearly broke up the currency area.

SANTIAGO (Reuters) – Five years ago during the closing speeches of a summit in Chile, Spain’s king told Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to “shut up” in an exchange that epitomized the fruitless meetings between Europe and Latin America at the time.

Dominated by leftist rhetoric and instability in the Andes, the summits were sideshows to the rapid economic growth in Europe that followed the introduction of the euro a decade ago, and the concerns of Madrid and Brussels lay elsewhere.