France vows to respect euro rules

The French government will today unveil a budget which should see its economy respect EU deficit rules for the first time since 2001.

Paris has for three consecutive years failed to stick to EU rules, which state that a country's budget deficit must be below three percent of its gross domestic product (GDP).

But French finance minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, will today announce that Paris will sneak under the three percent bar in 2005, with a deficit of 2.9 percent of GDP.

"Th...