Kenny refuses offers to meet Sarkozy

TAOISEACH Enda Kenny confirmed he has so far refused offers to meet French president Nicolas Sarkozy who is blocking a reduction of the interest rate on Ireland’s bailout.

Mr Kenny said he will meet him “in due course” but appeared in no rush to do so, despite France holding up any progress on securing a cheaper deal for taxpayers.

Responding to reports that senior French officials were “amazed” he had not travelled to Paris to discuss the interest rate issue, Mr Kenny confirmed that he had been asked.

“When I met President Sarkozy on the last occasion in Brussels, he did say to me that we should have a meeting, and he did say more than once that we should have that,” Mr Kenny told the Dáil.

“But we’ll have it in due course and at the appropriate time.”

Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin said the taoiseach should end his “hands-off policy” and arrange to meet “face-to-face the leaders that are standing in the way of delivering the better terms” of the bailout. He pointed to commitments made by Mr Kenny before the election that he would use his contacts in Europe to secure a reduction on the interest rate on the EU’s share of the €85bn bailout.

“Since the election, you have held bilateral meetings with only one European leader involved in our funding package, Prime Minister Cameron, and you refused to even ask him about reducing the interest rate,” Mr Martin said during Leaders’ Questions.

“A series of meetings with European leaders could do a lot to resolve this issue from the Irish perspective.”

However, Mr Kenny said that when Fine Gael entered office it discovered the relationship with European partners “was nothing short of disgraceful”. He accused ministers in the previous administration of not attending meetings they were supposed to attend.

Fianna Fáil sources later said a small number of meetings were missed by the then finance minister Brian Lenihan, or then foreign affairs minister, Mr Martin, for personal reasons.

But the source said any meetings that were missed were a result of Fine Gael and Labour in opposition withdrawing pairing arrangements, forcing ministers to be present in the Dáil for votes.