Poland urges Germany to do more to solve euro crisis

Mr Sikorski says the eurozone's collapse would be "the biggest threat" to Poland

Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski has called on Germany to do more to resolve the debt crisis in the eurozone and avert the euro's collapse.

In an unusually forthright speech, he said such a collapse would be "the biggest threat to the security and prosperity of Poland".

Eurozone finance ministers are meeting in Brussels later to discuss ways to expand the region's bailout fund.

This is seen as key to preventing more countries being sucked into the crisis.

Poland is not yet in the 17-nation eurozone, but is treaty-bound to join the single currency, as are its fellow former communist neighbours in the EU.

In a speech in Berlin on Monday evening, Mr Sikorski said: "There is nothing inevitable about Europe's decline. But we are standing on the edge of a precipice. This is the scariest moment of my ministerial life but therefore also the most sublime."

"The biggest threat to the security and prosperity of Poland would be the collapse of the eurozone.

"And I demand of Germany that, for your own sake and for ours, you help it survive and prosper. You know full well that nobody else can do it.

"I will probably be the first Polish foreign minister in history to say so, but here it is: I fear German power less than I am beginning to fear German inactivity."

"You have become Europe's indispensable nation.

A breakup of the eurozone - a possibility now being openly talked about - "would be a crisis of apocalyptic proportions beyond our financial system", he added.

On Monday, France and Germany proposed closer ties between eurozone economies, including binding limits on borrowing.