Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti warned on Friday that if the leaders of the eurozone's four largest economies fail to come up with plans to solve the eurozone economic crisis, the political and economic future of Europe would be at risk, dpa reported. Monti was scheduled to host German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy for talks beginning at 2 pm (1200 GMT). In an interview with six leading European newspaper, the Italian premier stressed that the outcome of the meeting could determine the success or failure of a June 28 and 29 European Union summit in Brussels which will focus on the economic crisis. If EU leaders fail to come up with plans to deal with contagion threat that began in Greece and has spread to Spain and Italy, "there would be progressively greater speculative attacks on individual countries, with harassment of the weaker countries," Monti said. In such a scenario "the frustration of the public towards Europe would grow," the Italian premier was quoted as saying by Britain's The Guardian, one of the six newspapers which interviewed him. "To emerge in good shape from the crisis of the eurozone and the European economy, ever more integration is needed," Monti said. But he warned that if the summit failed to resolve the problems quickly, "public opinion, but also that of the governments and parliament ... will turn against that greater integration." Monti's remarks came a day after the International Monetary Fund (IMF) challenged the way the eurozone was trying to solve its crisis by calling for more action from the European Central Bank (ECB) and criticising the terms of an upcoming Spanish bank rescue. The IMF urged "a more creative and inventive monetary policy" that might involve a reactivation of the ECB's bond-buying programme, which last year helped contain a surge in Italian and Spanish bond yields. Spain and Italy have seen yields on their government bonds soar over the last week, with Spain's borrowing costs, in particular, reaching what many analysts consider to be unsustainable levels. At the Rome talks, Monti is expected to try and bridge a split in the approaches favoured by Germany and France in dealing with the debt crisis.
