Austerity budgets could rock Europe

PARIS, June 14 (UPI) -- The European Commission president fears that democracies are threatened by the continent's severe budget crises, trade union chief John Monks said.

Monks, the general-secretary of the European Trade Union Congress, said he spoke with President Jose Manuel Barroso Friday and that "his message was blunt."

Monk paraphrased Barroso, saying: "'Look, if they do not carry out these austerity packages, these countries could virtually disappear in the way that we know them as democracies. They've go no choice, this is it,'" the EUobserver reported Monday.

"He's very, very worried. He shocked us with an apocalyptic vision of democracies in Europe collapsing because of the state of indebtedness," Monk said.

For the opposite reason, Monk said he also believed democracies were threatened.

Monk said his reasoning is that the austerity packages will create social unrest, leading to military interventions.

"This is extremely dangerous. This is 1931, we're heading back to the 1930s, with the Great Depression and we ended up with militarist dictatorship," he said.

Panic in Europe started in February with news that Greece could default on its government debt. As the fear of default began undermining the euro, the currency shared by 16 nations, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and others began working on austerity spending proposals. Proposed or approved budget cuts include Greece and Italy slashing spending by $29 billion, Germany by $96 billion, Britain by $9.1 billion and France and the Netherlands by $55 billion.