Belgian Parties To Form Coalition Government
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PARIS — Belgium’s feuding political parties agreed to form a coalition government yesterday after nine months of political chaos that threatened to carve the seat of the European Union into separate nations.
“It’s a good deal for a government, with balanced measures,” the Flemish Christian Democrat who is scheduled to become prime minister Thursday, Yves Leterme, told local RTBF radio after an all-night bargaining session among the country’s five political parties. The power-sharing agreement tackled the acrimonious immigration, tax and social issues, but it did not resolve the root of the government crisis: demands from politicians of the economically prosperous northern Flemish region for greater autonomy from the financially depressed, southern French-speaking section of the country. In a rare act of royal intervention, King Albert II of Belgium has been pushing the political parties to find a way to create a coalition government capable of running the kingdom, which has been consumed by political discord since last June’s elections.