and welcome to the spotlight the interview. of today my guest on the show is christine legarde the eurozone has been living through a severe financial problems it cost billions and billions of euros to help grace billions were sent to ireland to bail it out of its financial debt people say that spain and italy also may be the weak but countries like france and germany are still optimistic what is their optimism based on why are they still advocating the euro and the euro zone will ask the french finance minister christine. the london stock exchange says france will be next on the least of bond investors when they're finished with portugal and spain but despite claims france's deficit is higher than anyone realizes many experts say paris has nothing to worry about

for now the figures are hopeful the country's deficit is about seven percent which is to be lowered to just three percent in a couple years. with such positive dynamics no wonder french finance minister christine legarde was named one of the best in the european union. thank you very much for being with us on the show and welcome to moscow. i know you had a chat with with finance minister could. a new arrival to the what were the first things you talk about. problems or some nice things he told me how nice it was to see me yet again. a little bit here and i told him that i was ever so pleased to see him yet again you know we have a very very good and longstanding relationship. this morning when i gave the talk

the master of ceremonies said you've been in the job for such a long time i'm not sure it's a compliment. but it does given me a chance to work a lot with the with the so. with alexei that is a very very good thing do you do general enjoy coming to moscow i love coming to moscow really even if you know what even in winter this is even in winter and i love the snow and i think that. it creates a lot of problem in paris but moscow seems to be so used to the snow that it makes traffic not as complicated as in paris so i can tell you well you should say thank you to moscow authorities is not the snow it's them that they're try keeping it keeping immoral there's normal for visitors like here from vienna. ok now let's talk about finance. the one of the main news for everybody not only for for

for a financial experts was a was actually count on them who called for a social revolution against french banks and he said better than seven five december that people should withdraw their money from banks this didn't happen but what was your personal attitude to come to know as revolution that i think everyone should play to their skills is skill is clearly to be a fantastic soccer player football player and a dumb thing that you should expand beyond your area of skills that was my immediate reaction on the merits of it. i have to say that the financial industry relies on several factors one of which is trust and our job as members of government anywhere in the world is to make sure the trust is warranted. that is respected and to do that we need to put in place rules principles sanctions if

the rules are not respected and the authorities that can investigate determine it eventually breach and apply the same passions and that's what we're trying to do at the g twenty levels for instance we do that together russia participates friends participates and we need to have those rules so that the people that actually save . trust the banks and the financial institutions to actually keep and mudge savings feel confortable with all that so we have a responsibility as members of government to make sure that the rules are there they are respected and that those who do not respect the rules actually are sanctioned france is one of the most socially active countries that people go from live on sea and i know it gives you. probably hard times when when when when things like that happen but on the other hand don't you feel that this is good that this

is positive that the people of your country not only you the guy but also the people feel their responsibility they want to do something about what's happening in the country in the in the finance they want to control the government it's hard for you but is it good or bad i think it's good should be good do you like it well we've that we've we've had a democratic system in place for centuries and you know democracy is about checks and balances give and take and clearly we are responsible and accountable to the people of france and it's only fair that we should you know do the best we can and then go back to the next election and be either confirmed or denied at the level of confidence that was just a foid the fact that we are in position to set the rules and make sure they are respected but you know i'll take an example president sarkozy was very keen

to number one restoril the public finances of france number to reform the countries so that it is competitive. become positive you have to do two things put more work in the economy put more capital in the economy to put more work in the economy you need to extend the working lives a bit and that's how we reformed the pension system and that did not please everybody because when you tell people that we all have to work a little bit longer some of them don't like it so there was a lot of give and take a lot of consultation a lot of discussions people took the streets we had you know hundreds of thousands of people taking the street to express their views but at the end of the day the parliamentary process is the one that actually sets the final rules and it's for us to make sure that it is applied so france at the end of the day reformed its

pension system which is a good thing are you mentioned the g. twenty france is currently currently cheering the g eight and g twenty and your country is known as an advocate of a totally new financial system a global financial system that should wrister restore conditions for a sustainable and balanced economic growth well what are the concrete french proposals concerning those there this new system i'll take two examples one in the monetarist system at the moment we have a system that does not work properly they are erratic variation of currencies unpredictable in the main and that leads a lot of capital to flow in and out particularly of emerging markets we need to have more visibility more predictability and to that end clearly we need

to organize financial safety nets that operate on a regional level but that are properly called a native at the international level. we need to sync about a reserve currency that would be more balanced that would have a sufficient number of currencies to balance out the risks and clearly those special drawing rights that were mentioned by keynes in his initial sinking is what avenue that we could explore with the i.m.f. that's an option you know her be a member of keynes. you know you haven't wherever they are undermining the next mayor and the other asking some of his proposals are very interesting and very good i'm not a ok now. fanatic no not at all a you know i'm asking that in on the monitor recently in relation to currencies in

particular some of his views to arrive at a musket of currency that could give rise to the special drawing rights and is something that we need to have in mind particularly in times of crisis i think that that could that should be envisaged so that's one example second example in the field of raw materials for instance when you look at the variations of the price of wheat when you look at the variations of the price of aluminum or the price of copper there is something which is not only related to anticipation of crops to risk of drought to volume of copper volume of aluminum being made there's more to it and i sing that we should have more transparency on the transactions which we don't. we should have more understanding of. the trading that takes place and we don't have much of that

and we should really investigate whether the regulations in place to rule the functioning of these markets are proper to avoid the firmaments of either bubbles or rarity of physical material so i think that's another example where i believe that international corporation can actually help and it would not just help the markets it would help the farmers it would help the countries that actually produce those for materials and maybe it would direct a bit more money to real investment the one that creates value the one that creates jobs rather than the one that shul's speculation are you looking for for any support or for your plans for your reform here in russia or russia. these days with a new security system in europe. anything that we improve

in relation to the financial world in relation to the global governance will have to be done with russia will have to be done with all the key players because if you leave one big spot of the world out of the equation. then you cannot achieve the goal because there will be you know flows of unregulated. unpredictable capitals that would that will go in that direction so we have to work together and we do so happily with says christine like gas the finance minister of the republic of france spotlight will be back shortly so break so stay with us then go. to. wealthy british style sign. on.

the. market. find out what's really happening to the global economy with my next concert for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines cons a report on our. chosen from among many. he was given a clear cut mission. a mission he successfully accomplished. became the first ever encounter space. in the soviet union one of the best known persons in the cold war. all his thoughts were focused on flight. could he ever think that his life's work would cost him his life.

what happened in those few seconds. and what she could see these sealed barrels still. keurig are any. would be so much brighter if you knew about sun from the finest impression. placed on tati dot com. the big. welcome back to spotlight i'm al green of in just

a reminder that my guest on the show today is christine legarde the french finance minister. was your own countries continue to feel the effects of the good book created crime charge her says debt crisis was the start of the dominion with fact in the euro zone ireland has recently become the second e.u. country to be bailed out by the e.c.b. and the international monetary fund to receive the eighty five billion here a bailout the irish government had to resort to severe austerity plans include incur tale in the minimum wage and cutting public service jobs the plans led to mass protests with thousands of people taking to the streets of dublin and there are fears that he too in the third largest year resume an economy might start plunging in the same direction as greece and ireland rome has to service billions of debts in the first quarter of next year with bond rates already raising the cost of a telling born is likely to boom among other countries threatened by the sovereign

different demeanor of fact as spain portugal and belgium with so many countries or trees being pulled into the crisis doubts about the future of the single currency and of even the oh you might sell have grown. in told word if i'm not mistaken president sarkozy and chancellor merkel struck a deal and yet are now and their debt resolution mechanism that might eventually force private lenders to take losses in case of a government debt crisis when a when do you think this mechanism may be applied point number one we want that mechanism to apply exactly in line with the i.m.f. rules and principles of private sector involvement because we have to have

all the lead lenders of the public sector whether it's to european fond of the international monetary fund operate under similar principles because you cannot have one being more rigorous than the others why because we have decided to work in partnership with the i.m.f. so in other words when we have a problem of assistance to a country that state island for instance which had difficulties we decided that we would go together the european financial fund stability fund and the i.m.f. we need to have similar terms and conditions we cannot play in other words the lenders or the country itself cannot play one against the other it has to be similar point number one point number two it cannot be a standard across the board straitjacket it has to be evaluated on

a case by case basis and on the basis of the sustained sustainability of the situation both from a debt point of view and from an economy point of view as well when we review the situation. well let's say you mention ireland some economists say that and in case of such countries as greece and ireland the only way for them is just to default on their debt like russia did back in nineteen ninety eight well why if it worked with russia it won't work with. other european countries why why is europe insisting on bailing them out it's a two way street and that's why we believe that it can work we ask from the country whether it's greece or whether it's ireland what we call strict conditionalities in other words we asked them to take very hard stiff rigorous measures to rein

their public finance so what we do is we take the estimated grows the potential for growth the demand that is addressed to the country from the rest of the world we look at the measures they are prepared to take and they are courageous enough to take to parliament. cutting public finances reducing the number of civil servants extending the volume of work in the economy facilitating the economic activity and them on the basis of those set of parliament has then we say this is sustainable and we will lend you over such period of time at such interest rate but not enough we need to monitor and follow up with the country because neither the i of earth nor the europeans together want to lend you know freehand we need to check at every installment of the loan of the measures that were promised are

actually delivered and that it is performed on the ground do you think that spain and portugal will be the next to live at the expense of the french and the german taxpayer not at all no not at all are you sure it's the this is not going to help i am willing to take we can put them back to you why am i looking carefully at what portugal is going to do it in terms of public finances strategy quick forms structural efforts and looking at what spain has just announced a few days ago more privatization cuts yet again restoring public finances in the way it does and i think that those two countries have really received loud and clear the message that they have to put their house in order which they are doing and we collectively members of the eurozone are very firm that who will support the efforts in one of your interviews you said quote we are keen to keep the moment to

rezone and the currency is strong alive and kicking and quite will the european one tree union survive a chain of debt crisis an existing forum. all over the world there is currently an issue of the sovereign debt ok so everyone from the united states to japan lucky to not including russia because your public debt is kept at a minimum. but there's something you've heard that you've had a crisis in here but all over the world as i said there is a sovereign debt issue which in my view is a clear message that all over the world in those countries we have to be very very strict at managing our public finances at restoring the trend of a ratio of debt to g.d.p. and reduce our deficit but that's the point that is being made very clearly now

within the eurozone what we need to do is to reinforce our economy governance our economy government so that the messages that we're giving are loud and clear straightforward and there is no ambiguity or uncertainty as to what we are doing but let's make no mistake the euro is a solid and strong currency in our remember ten years ago the euro was launched at the rate of one point sixteen euro to the dollar it is not the range of one thirty ish to the dollar so not only has it remained. strong but it has increased in value relative to other currencies so it's not the euro or such it's sovereign that and government all over the world that have to be very sensitive and careful about how we manage public line and i

understand you like the euro this way you like the euro to be strong but if we talk not our french interests but eventually some of the indirect countries would not be healthier for those. problem economies to quit the euro zone to devalued their currencies and end it in this way to support the economy but why. is it possible for for europe to withstand the loss of a couple of small economies no quitting and visaged no book and no quoting. ok now is there any possibility that france can be next to fall in the european that debt crisis no no so are you sure. we are taking the measures that are necessary when other measures and we are following our policies very strictly and very rigorously

and the french banks they are said to be to be to maybe the next in the line after italy. what are your preparations what are you doing what are the specific measures that you're taking care can you be more specific on that. the friendly banks are solid they were the crisis quite well we've had no bankruptcy we've had no bank run we've had no such thing as occurred in other places no default no nurse things of that nature and that they are very strictly regulated and supervised we have a central potential authority which is really taking its toll sk very very seriously and i have no concern in that regard ok air of only one minute left on this show and i and i really don't know where i'll start there are many

questions i still want to ask you ok now now let's go with this one let's let's talk about the mistrials the the two helicopter carriers that that russia is being ready to to buy from france how important is it for you and the when do you think this this deal may be complete you know there is a saying in english that. it's not over until the fat lady sings. so when a deal is a negotiation it's in negotiation you don't talk about it but clearly it would be a very strong symbol of the very close relationship and the partnership. the twin friends with russia and we really want that partnership to take full expression not just in exchanging musicians and dancers and painters and writers not just having its roots in the history of all two countries that have been so close over the years but also in the industries of the future you're being

superstitious they're not talking about the future deal no you never talk you never talk about something that is to be born so so so all the finance ministers a superstitious is there i think this is part of your job ok thank you very much see them and then and just to remind that my guest here on the show today was french finance minister christine legarde and that's it for now from all of us here spotlight will be back with more for his own comments on what's going on in and outside bush up until then stay on r.t. and take care.

india is a made to believe the move to join. the gateway to the ground imperial truly to tell you what. you can to let socialist see don't need to go publicly and run to the colonel was

a total retreat. a draft report from the council of europe claims that for the last a decade kosovo's prime minister has been behind a mafia like structure responsible for organ trafficking weapons and drug smuggling the kosovo government says the allegations are an attempt to discredit the liberation army. no christmas cheer for you us lawmakers until a new strategic arms reduction treaty with russia gets ratified democrats are pushing for the republicans to agree to a nuclear pact before they lose the majority needed to pass it in the senate if approved the treaty would reduce the new york nuclear arsenals of both countries by a third. and the wiki leaks founder by a british court but his supporters fear the u.s. is still trying to get its hands on him sweden wants to extradite giuliana songe in connection with allegations of sexual assault charges he denied. up next cross-talk peter lavelle and his guest debate whether new u.s.

legislation to educate the children of illegal immigrants is a pipe dream or the future of a pipe dream of future integration or realistic response to current immigration issues it's coming your way next stay with us. and you can. follow him welcome to cross dot com peter lavelle they have a dream the development relief and education for alien minors act is languishing in the u.s. senate legislation most americans agree with is this bill commonsense immigration policy or is it a sham rewarding those who break the law. to discuss washington's new immigration legislation i'm joined by marty.