On Monday Prime Minister Rajoy launches his European agenda and its double objective: remove all doubts about the Spanish economy that have risen in the past few months and attempt to make a spot for himself in the inner sanctum of European policy that is run by Germany and backed by France.
Rajoy wants to join German chancellor Angela Merkel and French prime minister Nicolas Sarkozy, a pair that Italian prime minister Mario Monti has already aligned with, although some are making a saturnine medical analogy: "It is like one patient attended by two doctors." The reading is what it is, but certainly Monti will be in the picture with his two partners on Friday, January 20 in Rome. This is ten days before the Council of Europe. Mariano Rajoy will keep himself out of the picture for now.
On Monday, Rajoy meets with Sarkozy at Moncloa and on January 26 he will travel to Berlin to meet with Merkel. He will not be able to sit down with Sarkozy and Merkel until going to Brussels on January 30, which will be his first time with both leaders since being elected prime minister.
Meanwhile, Rajoy will meet with European Council president Herman Van Rompuy on Tuesday at Moncloa to discuss national debt goals and the execution of necessary structural reforms.