Europe Debt Crisis, Eurozone Bailout | featured news

European Union leaders made some progress toward a strategy to fight the euro zone's sovereign debt crisis on Sunday, nearing agreement on bank recapitalization and on how to leverage their rescue fund to try to stop bond market contagion.

A top bank lobbyist insisted Saturday that banks and the eurozone are far from reaching a deal to cut Greece's debt, despite claims by eurozone finance ministers that they will ask banks to take steeper losses on their Greek bonds.

Slovakian lawmakers on Thursday approved expanding the size and powers of the EU bailout fund, overcoming an earlier rejection and removing the last hurdle to the fund's use as the continent's main weapon against the debt crisis.