Monti insists ‘Europe has no reason to fear Italy’

ITALIAN Prime Minister Mario Monti prepared for a New Year campaign to reassure European partners his technocrat government can boost the ailing economy, with an unexpected and apparently private visit to Brussels yesterday.

Monti flew to the Belgian capital, where he previously worked as a European commissioner, ahead of a series of meetings with European leaders aimed at rebuilding confidence in Italy’s battered public finances.

“Europe has no reason to fear Italy any more,” Mr Monti told the French daily, Le Figaro, ahead of a one-day visit to Paris, where he will meet President Nicolas Sarkozy and Prime Minister Francois Fillon today and speak at a conference at the Finance Ministry.