Britain to rejoin EU talks to address debt crisis

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British officials will rejoin talks with EU counterparts to negotiate a new fiscal agreement, a Downing Street spokesman said on Friday.

"The prime minister reiterated that he wants the new fiscal agreement to succeed, and to find the right way forward that ensures the EU institutions fulfil their role as guardian of the EU treaty on issues such as the single market," the spokesman said on behalf of the British Prime Minister David Cameron.

"That's why we have today agreed to participate in technical discussions to take forward this work," he said, adding that the European Council had invited them to join talks with 17 eurozone and nine other EU states.

The spokesman said the prime minister's aim had instead to make it clear that the Britain wanted to "engage constructively" in talks about the intergovernmental agreement between eurozone and other EU states.

Cameron's stance has been that he supports moves for closer fiscal integration within the eurozone to help it deal with the debt crisis. But he would not agree to treaty changes that would involve all 27 EU states last week, arguing he had not been given safeguards for Britain's financial services industry.

British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said the outcome of Cameron's EU veto last week was "bad for Britain", and he did not attend a session in the House of Commons on Monday in which Cameron explained to MPs his justification for using the veto in Brussels.

But the Liberal Democratic leader later on Wednesday said on behalf of the "whole government" that the ministers are "absolutely determined to re-engage with our European partners."

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