the euro as an international currency. furthermore, with regard to the greek issue, there was genuine consensus within the eurogroup that greece had to respect the rules of the game of economic and monetary union ( emu ). the crux of the debate chiefly concerned the tension between the democratic legitimacy of an elected government and that of its european creditors, which also need to be accountable to their citizens regarding the fate of their loans or in granting a new support package. an agreement was signed in august and it is important for the new greek government to implement it in a forceful way with a view to quickly re - establishing confidence and enabling the greek economy to recover. that said, the greek crisis also highlighted the need to simplify the governance of the euro area. this experience demonstrated, for example, that decision - making by simple majority within a common institution such as the ecb is more efficient and faster than intergovernmental decision - making and that it is necessary to strengthen the convergence of the euro area economies and facilitate the completion of economic and monetary union in the spirit of the “ five presidents ’ report ” published in june this year – editor ’ s note : composed of donald tusk ( european council ), martin schulz ( european parliament ), jean - claude juncker ( european commission ), jeroen dijsselbloem ( eurogroup ) and mario draghi ( ecb ). bis central bankers ’ speeches to what extent can the ecb contribute to strengthening the international status of the euro? while the prospect of seeing the euro play a substantial international role alongside the dollar may have been considered by some as a motivation for its creation, its promotion does not feature anywhere in the treaty. likewise, on monetary issues, the ecb ’ s primary mandate is to maintain price stability. we neither encourage nor discourage the international role for the euro, which continues to be essentially determined by the markets. that said, progress towards a genuine financial union, with better connected capital markets, could indirectly support their depth and liquidity and, in doing so, the international role of the euro. even if this strengthening of the euro were not an aim in itself, it would attest to the continued confidence of the rest of the world in the single currency, but also to the success of the european union in completing emu. bis central bankers ’ speeches

benoit cœure : interview with radio classique interview with mr benoit cœure, member of the executive board of the european central bank, and radio classique, conducted by mr nicolas pierron on 23 january 2017. * * * mario draghi, president of the european central bank, is to be investigated by the ombudsman of the european union, following a complaint from an ngo. he is suspected of entrusting the private sector with insider information in the context of a group called the g30. how do you respond to these allegations? the mere fact that those questions are being asked shows that we are transparent, since all meetings of the members of the executive board of the ecb with representatives of the private sector, whether bankers or not, are made public. as a matter of fact, my calendar, my diary, is published every month on the ecb ’ s website. as for the substance of your question, for us to be able to understand what is happening in the economy we have to meet private sector actors, including bankers. and yet, this has to be done in a transparent way, which is the case with the g30. so this won ’ t go any further? the ombudsman of the european union is pursuing the matter, she ’ s doing her job and we shall see what she has to say. but the same ombudsman, ms o ’ reilly, acknowledged that the ecb had made significant progress in its transparency and its communication policy, notably with the publication of the minutes of governing council decisions and also, as i said, with the publication of our calendars. so the ecb has made great efforts to be more transparent and to make its contacts with the private sector public. this is not a matter of pride, it ’ s completely normal. donald trump was sworn in on friday in the united states. his programme includes a sizeable fiscal stimulus, which is already pushing up interest rates in the us, bond rates. will this have an impact on europe? it is undoubtedly too early to judge the decisions of the new administration as it is only just beginning, but i would draw two conclusions. the first is that it is very important for us that financial conditions in the euro area remain appropriate for the euro area economy, i. e. that the euro area is protected from external financial shocks. for example, the rise in long - term interest rates observed since the end of last year has had a fairly