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Europe's debt crisis could trigger violent revolution and war, warns French foreign minister
By Jason Groves
Last updated at 10:43 AM on 1st December 2011
Dire warning: French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said the debt crisis 'could trigger the explosion of the EU'
Europe is facing an ‘existential crisis’ that could end in violent revolution and war, the French foreign minister warned last night.
In the bleakest assessment yet of the euro crisis, Alain Juppe, a former French prime minister, said the spiralling debt crisis could trigger ‘the explosion of the European Union itself’.
Mr Juppe told the French news magazine L’Express that the deepening crisis was creating a dangerous breeding ground for violent nationalism, reminiscent of the 1930s.
He said: ‘This is an existential crisis for Europe that raises the spectre of a return to violent conflict on our continent.
‘This could call into question all that we have created, not only in the 20 years since the Maastricht Treaty, but since the foundation of the European community.
‘In that eventuality, everything becomes possible, even the worst. It could be the explosion of the European Union itself.
‘We have flattered ourselves for decades that we have eradicated the danger of conflict inside our continent, but let’s not be too sure. We’ve gone too far to not go further.’
Mr Juppe’s dire warning came just days after one of France’s leading economists said the single European currency only had a ‘50-50 chance’ of surviving until Christmas.
Bleak: Juppe debates the crisis with Spanish Foreign Affairs minister Trinidad Jimenez today at the EU headquarters in Brussels
Jacques Attali, the former president of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, said ‘instant and urgent’ action was needed to prevent the euro from collapsing within weeks.
Last month the German Chancellor Angela Merkel also warned that failure to resolve the euro crisis was a potential threat to peace and stability in Europe.
But despite numerous ‘crisis summits’ in recent months EU leaders have been unable to agree a package that will satisfy the financial markets they are serious about shoring up ailing countries like Greece, Portugal and Italy and saving the euro.
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