欧盟软化对西班牙紧缩立场

Brussels is to allow Spain to miss its deficit targets for this year and next, declaring that Madrid has enacted sufficient economic reforms in the clearest sign yet that the European Commission is softening its austerity-focused response to the crisis.

欧盟委员会(European Commission)将允许西班牙达不到今年和明年的减赤目标。该委员会宣告，西班牙政府已实施了充分的经济改革。这是迄今最明显的标志，显示欧盟委员会正在软化其以紧缩为重点的危机应对立常

Olli Rehn, EU economic commissioner, yesterday declined to set new budget targets for Spain and gave the country a clean bill of health based on the structural reforms unveiled by Madrid in its budget in September.

欧盟(EU)经济事务专员奥利·雷恩(Olli Rehn)昨日拒绝为西班牙设定新的预算目标，并基于该国政府9月在预算中公布的结构改革措施，为该国开出了一张健康证明。

The decision sends a strong signal that the commission is moving closer to the International Monetary Fund’s view of the crisis, which envisages more flexibility for struggling countries such as Greece, where fixed deficit targets have forced drastic budget cuts even during deep recessions.

这一决定释放出一个强烈的信号，说明欧盟委员会开始接近国际货币基金组织(IMF)对危机的看法。后者认为，需要给予希腊等困境国家更大灵活度，固定的减赤目标迫使这些国家即便在经济严重衰退的情况下也要大幅削减预算。

The revision, approved by the commission yesterday, came as anti-austerity demonstrations gripped the capitals of several struggling eurozone countries, including Spain and Portugal.

欧盟委员会昨日批准这项修正之际，西班牙、葡萄牙等多个身处困境的欧元区国家的首都发生了反对紧缩政策的示威活动。

Mr Rehn said: “We are not so much focused on the nominal targets, even though they often make easier headlines because they are exact percentages. To my mind, [the revision is] both the right way of doing it from an economic point of view but also the correct way of applying [EU rules].

雷恩表示：“我们不是很注重名义目标，尽管这些目标更容易成为资讯标题（因为它们是精确的百分数）。在我看来，（这项修正）从经济学的角度来看是正确的，也是实施（欧盟规则）的正确方式。

Spain was supposed to reduce its deficit to 6.3 per cent of gross domestic product this year and 4.5 per cent next year. Despite the insistence of Luis de Guindos, Spain’s finance minister, this week that those targets would be met, EU projections expect an 8 per cent deficit this year and 6 per cent in 2013.

按计划，西班牙今年的赤字水平应降至其国内生产总值(GDP)的6.3%，明年应降至4.5%。尽管西班牙财长路易斯·德金多斯(Luis de Guindos)本周坚称这两个目标可以实现，但欧盟预测，西班牙今年的赤字水平将为该国GDP的8%，明年将为6%。

Mr Rehn warned against reading the decision as a eurozone-wide shift in policy, saying Brussels would need to “look at every country case by case. He said Spain would need to do more in 2014, when Madrid is required to reduce its budget deficit, which was 11 per cent of GDP at the end of last year, to less than the EU threshold of 3 per cent.

雷恩警告称，勿将这一决定解读为整个欧元区的政策转向。他表示，欧盟委员会可能需要“根据每个国家的不同情况作出不同决定。雷恩表示，西班牙在2014年将需要采取更多行动，届时西班牙政府必须将预算赤字降至欧盟的门槛（GDP的3%）以下，而去年底西班牙的预算赤字水平为其GDP的11%。