Slovak FinMin proposes backing euro safety net

Slovakia should end its resistance and sign off on the euro zone's planned emergency loan facility, the finance ministry proposed on Wednesday, bending to pressure from European partners.
Slovakia, the euro zone's poorest member, has been holding up Europe's 750-billion-euro EFSF scheme to help countries in trouble and refused to contribute 800 million euros in bilateral aid in a separate plan for debt-laden Greece.
The Finance Ministry, in a draft resolution to be presented to a cabinet session on Thursday, proposed the government sign a framework agreement on creating the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), and that Slovakia takes part in the scheme.
Leaders of the centre-right coalition of Prime Minister Iveta Radicova were due to meet on the issue later on Wednesday.
"There will be a coalition meeting tonight to debate this issue," Radicova told reporters after the government meeting, adding the cabinet would meet again on Thursday.
Finance Minister Ivan Miklos, a fiscal hawk, said this week's negotiations with his EU counterparts in Brussels on Slovakia's position were not easy. The previous government led by Robert Fico supported the aid schemes.
"Today, we are in a situation when we choose only among bad solutions," Miklos told reporters.
Slovakia joined the single currency in 2009, but the euro zone's debt crisis and demands to chip in to bail out richer members was far from what Slovaks expected from membership.
Miklos said he thought it was wrong that a country with gross domestic product (GDP) per capita of just 72% of the EU's average be expected to help richer countries.
The Slovak minimum monthly wage is 308 euros and the average is 725 euros, which is below even the minimum legal Greek wage of 863 euros. Opinion polls have shown two-thirds of Slovaks are against extending aid.
European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has said he expected Bratislava to sign the EFSF very soon, while Eurogroup chairman Jean-Claude Juncker expected Slovaks to sign the framework agreement (on the EFSF) and take on board all the commitments made by the previous cabinet.
If Bratislava signs off on the EFSF vehicle, it can move ahead. However the Slovak parliament would still have to vote on Slovak participation worth 4.5 bln euro in guarantees.