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Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy vowed Tuesday to meet a public deficit target of 4.4 percent of output as Madrid scrambles to retain investor confidence amid the eurozone debt crisis.
“Spain will respect the deficit target. Today that is 4.4 percent and Spain will respect that target,” Rajoy told a joint press conference with Portuguese counterpart Pedro Passos Coelho.
The Spanish premier made the comments after EU economic affairs commissioner Olli Rehn told Spain it must meet its 2012 deficit target even though the figure for 2011 was likely to be higher than expected.
“It is essential that sustainability of public finances be restored without delay and therefore our view is that it is essential to to meet the fiscal targets for 2012,” Rehn said earlier in Brussels.
On Sunday, Spanish budget minister Cristobal Montoro called for the deficit target to be relaxed because the 2012 growth forecasts on which it was based no longer looked attainable.