Ahead of the meeting French finance minister Christine Lagarde spoke to the German business daily Handelsblatt about the need for joint measures.69 After the fraught transnational negotiations to rescue Dexia and Fortis, she was seriously concerned about the ability of small countries to cope with the crisis. “What would happen if a little European Union state confronted a bank collapse?” she asked rhetorically. “Maybe the government would not have the means to save the institution in question. So the question arises of a solution at the European level.”
