EU targets boosted rescue fund of '€1-2.0tn'

European Union leaders will discuss boosting the capacity of their eurozone rescue fund to between "one and two trillion euros," an EU diplomat said on Wednesday. The new target represents a significant drop from the previously stated aim of "at least 2.5 trillion euros" worth of firepower under various schemes to "leverage" upwards the 440-billion-euro European Financial Stability Facility. The source said that EU president Herman Van Rompuy had been in discussions with outgoing European Central bank chief Jean-Claude Trichet, the German and French governments and European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso. "Discussions are being held about raising the EFSF's capacity for intervention," without increasing the guarantees put up by eurozone governments, the source said. "The level set will be between one trillion and two trillion euros," he added. France and Germany have been at odds over recent days, French President Nicolas Sarkozy saying this weekend's meetings -- which start with finance ministers on Friday -- would decide Europe's "destiny," but Germany carefully downplaying the chances of radical solutions. The source also said that Sunday's summit of the 27 EU leaders, followed by talks among the 17 that make up the eurozone, would seek to raise the level of loss private investors take on their Greek government bonds towards 50 percent. He did not say how close to that target they would reach, in raising the level of debt write-down from the 21 percent agreed at a July eurozone summit under a second bailout for Athens that remains frozen.