(Reuters) - Slovakia rejected on Friday calls to sign Europe's 750 billion euro stability programme, a necessary step for the financial safety net to go ahead, amid political wrangling.
All countries must sign off on the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) before it can go ahead and Slovakia's rejection could jeopardise European finance ministers' plan for the facility to be operational by the end of June.
Slovakia was asked during a European Council meeting in Brussels on Thursday to sign the deal.
Outgoing Prime Minister Robert Fico, however, said his government lacked a mandate to do so. He said it was ready to sign if given the nod by centre-right parties that are trying to form a government after winning elections last week.
"We are ready to sign if they say 'Yes, we respect that mechanism'," Fico told a news conference on Friday.
Pressure has been building on Slovakia from abroad to take at least the first step and sign off on the facility.
"We are confident that the prime minister and the new government know their European responsibility", a German government spokesman said on Friday.
Slovakia is due to contribute around 4.5 billion euros to the 750 billion euro financial safety net, which was established by euro zone governments this month for member countries if they run into financial difficulty.
OPPOSITION TO GREEK AID
The issue has become the centre of a domestic political struggle between Fico's leftist administration, which lost its majority in the election, and centre-right parties, who have opposed European aid to Greece.
The conservative Christian Democrat Union (SDKU), the Christian Democrat Movement (KDH), the liberal Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) and the mostly ethnic Hungarian party Most-Hid have been negotiating to form a cabinet but have not yet won an official mandate from President Ivan Gasparovic.
The SDKU's election leader and the likely next prime minister, Iveta Radicova, said Fico had full authority to sign off on the EFSF.
"Slovakia's prime minister and the government have a full (power) to decide (on the EFSF)," Radicova told reporters earlier on Friday.
She declined to ask Fico to sign the plan and refused to comment on how she would decide.
Finance Minister Jan Pociatek slammed the opposition stance.
"This is like playing with an atomic bomb. It is unpredictable what could happen if the mechanism will not be available on time," he said.
Slovakia needs to sign the agreement on the EFSF but can later decide not to participate in the aid mechanism without preventing other countries from going ahead.
Once 90 percent of all the mechanism's guarantees are confirmed by participating countries, the aid scheme can become operational.
Slovakia has a separate problem concerning the 110 billion euro EU/IMF bailout package for debt-laden Greece.
The country, which joined the euro zone in 2009 and is much poorer than Greece, is due to vote next month on its 800 million euro contribution to the package. But, before the election, the centre-right parties refused to say whether they would commit Slovakia's share to the bailout should they take power.
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