Fifth, a strengthening of economic and fiscal coordination and surveillance and a commitment to put in place a set of measures, going beyond and above the recently adopted package on economic governance. In the period ahead, it is of paramount importance that this agreement is applied rigorously and quickly in all its dimensions.
Against this background, I would like to focus my intervention today – from my perspective as a central banker – on the challenging environment for monetary policy created by the ongoing euro area financial and sovereign debt crisis.