Europe, Europe Debt Crisis | featured news

With mounds of European debt due to be refinanced early next year, the crisis is far from over, and there are risks even in getting the Brussels deal ratified.

VIENNA (Reuters) - China will remain part of international efforts to help Europe through its crisis, vice foreign minister Fu Ying said on Saturday, dismissing the idea that Beijing was sitting back as the region suffered.

European Union members that use the euro agreed to sign a treaty that would require stricter financial and fiscal discipline, but two countries with their own currencies, Britain and Hungary, refused.

Stock indexes gave back some of their gains Monday and the euro turned lower against the dollar following a report that Germany and five other major European nations could risk having their credit ratings downgraded.

Italy and Spain have not asked to be rescued by the International Monetary Fund, the head of the lender said on Monday as she urged European leaders to quickly solve the region's festering debt crisis.

Europe’s debt crisis is going from bad to worse. The borrowing rates for troubled--and even not-so-troubled--European governments once again soared Friday, heightening the danger of an all-out collapse in Europe’s common currency. It comes as political leaders across the continent are all pointing to each other as needing to act to avert a worse outcome.

The worst week for the stock market in two months ended with a whimper in thin trading Friday. The Dow Jones industrial average lost 4.8 percent this week, while the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 4.7 percent. Both had their worst weeks since Sept. 23.

Rating agency Fitch downgraded Portugal's rating to junk status on Thursday, citing large fiscal imbalances, high debts and large fiscal imbalances.

Germany and France clashed on Wednesday over whether the ECB should take bolder steps to stem the euro zone debt crisis, with Chancellor Angela Merkel issuing one of her starkest warnings yet against fiddling with the central bank's strict inflation-fighting mandate.

Asian stocks slumped Friday after a spike in Spanish government borrowing costs added to the uncertainty over Europe's debt crisis and investors braced themselves for China.