UN chief meets with European Commission official on eurozone crisis

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki- moon met Monday with European Commission Vice President Olli Rehn on eurozone crisis.

During the meeting at the UN Headquarters in New York, "they discussed the euro area crisis, the Millennium Development Goals ( MDGS) and the post-2015 development agenda," UN spokesman Martin Nesirky said in a readout released to the press here, referring to a set of eight anti-poverty targets to be reached by 2015.

The UN chief expressed his appreciation for the actions taken by the European authorities in stabilizing the financial markets in the euro area, and encouraged the European Union to continue to provide leadership in accelerating progress on MDGs in the remaining 980 days and in promoting a coherent vision for post- 2015, said the readout.

Five years after the financial crisis broke out, the eurozone is still mired in economic stagnation or contraction, while most of others are recovering at various speeds.

Unacceptably high unemployment and high debt burdens in public and private sectors were the serious headache of European policymakers.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) expected the eurozone economy to fall by 0.3 percent this year, a more pessimistic forecast than last year, when it calculated a contraction of 0.1 percent.