Greek legislators approved a bailout package that may unlock as much as €86 billion and help the nation avoid a default next week when it has to make a payment to the European Central Bank.

Cutting Greece’s debt is likely to prove the core issue in the negotiations over the next few days with all sides under pressure on the issue.

Ireland found itself surrounded by supporters, for the first time, on the issue of corporate tax rates, during an informal meeting of EU finance ministers.

Frustrated finance ministers for the first time broke the taboo of talking about a “Plan B” for Greece at a fraught meeting in Riga.

France’s finance minister said yesterday that Paris had not restricted the use of HSBC client data it passed on to UK authorities to help pursue tax evaders, contradicting comments by a senior British official.

Greece’s finance minister is holding talks in Paris amid high tensions with international creditors, as his country’s new leftist leadership seeks to renegotiate huge debts.

Greece could be given more time to pay off its debt if it keeps its budget in balance and maintains promised reforms, French officials said yesterday.

The European Union said no nation has broken EU budget rules by a big enough margin to warrant immediate action, a move that gives France and Italy more time to win approval for their draft spending plans.

France and Italy unveiled plans yesterday to trim their deficits more than previously planned in last-minute pitches to get clemency from the European Commission on their 2015 budgets.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble said Germany’s response to a "clear weakening" of the economy would be a shift in public spending toward investments and away from government consumption.

French finance minister Michel Sapin said the European Central Bank has been "fast and efficient" with policies that have helped weaken the euro and now need reinforcing measures from governments.

France's Socialist government has detailed a €21bn cost-cutting plan, the biggest in the country's modern history, saying it will focus on trimming welfare benefits.

German deputy finance minister Steffen Kampeter urged countries such as France and Italy to live up to their policy commitments to boost the effectiveness of the European Central Bank’s monetary policy steps.

President François Hollande replaced his maverick leftist economy minister with a former Rothschild partner yesterday, in a reshuffle intended to reconcile his efforts to revive the stagnant French economy with deficit-cutting orthodoxy. 

France has reshuffled its government to silence dissidents that had openly criticised Socialist President Francois Hollande’s economic policy as he tries to pull the nation out of stagnation and steer it toward growth.

European finance ministers sent floundering French president François Hollande a firm message that he must keep to his commitments to get both debt and deficit down as agreed.

French president Francois Hollande has approved a new Cabinet that includes his ex-companion Segolene Royal as minister of environment and energy.

French president Francois Hollande’s new Socialist-led government adopted a 30% pay cut today, a gesture of shared sacrifice by leaders who must now reduce the country’s massive debts and tackle spiralling unemployment.

The likelihood of Ireland having to hold a second referendum on the fiscal treaty has been cut by the announcement the man tipped to be the next French president will seek an addition to the document rather than reopen it.

Tons of concrete collapsed from a ceiling over a waiting area in a passenger terminal at Paris’ largest airport today, killing at least six people and injuring three others, officials said.