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Deal struck on EU budget

Brussels - Top European Union officials reached a deal Thursday on the bloc's 2014-20 budget, paving the way for measures to tackle youth unemployment and stimulate growth following months of wrangling between the bloc's parliament and member states.

"This is a good deal for Europe, this is a good deal for Europe's citizens, this is a good deal for the European economy," Barroso said of the agreement reached with European Parliament President Martin Schulz and Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny, who represented member states.

Without the 960-billion-euro (1.25-trillion-dollar) budget, several of the measures being discussed Thursday at an EU summit to overcome the bloc's lingering economic crisis could not come into effect.

EU President Herman Van Rompuy welcomed the compromise, stressing that the seven-year budget was "an indispensable tool to help more young people to secure jobs."

"It must be effective as of 1 January 2014," he added, urging all parties to formally approve it without delay.

But many have argued that the funding plan, which represents the first real-term cut to a multi-year budget, does not go far enough to address the EU's economic woes.

Schulz said he would have to "fight in parliament for a majority" to approve the compromise, after lawmakers had rejected a previous deal, arguing that it did not fully take into account their demands aimed at maximizing resources.

"This is not what I thought would be the best solution, but it is the maximum I could, and we could, negotiate here," Schulz said. He said he would try to have the budget vote scheduled for next week's plenary session.

But initial reactions from parliament were mostly positive.

The European People's Party, the largest group in parliament, said the budget deal demonstrated responsibility "in times of economic difficulties," but avoided sentencing the EU to "seven years of rigour," in the words of chairman Joseph Daul.

Hannes Swoboda, the leader of the second-largest party, the Socialists and Democrats, said the deal was a "decisive improvement," and welcomed increased funding for youth employment schemes, as well as support for research and small and medium-sized enterprises.

But British lawmaker Martin Callanan, of the far smaller European Conservatives and Reformists group, complained that "too much EU money will still be spent on French cows and not enough on research and economic growth."

Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny said he was "confident" that all EU member states would support the deal. Ireland holds the bloc's rotating presidency until the end of the month.

Under the compromise, the budget will be reviewed in a few years' time -a key demand of the parliament - but spending increases will be limited to a maximum of 7 billion euros for 2018, 9 billion euros for 2019, and 10 billion euros for 2020.

These ceilings are in response to member states' fears that budgetary demands could balloon in the course of such a review, once the worst of the economic crisis is over.

The deal also takes into account lawmakers' calls for flexibility, by agreeing to place unspent funding during the first few years of the financial framework into a pot, to be redistributed across the latter half of the budget period.

Kenny also pledged that member states would agree by July 9 to a second top-up for the 2013 budget, which is short of 11.2 billion euros according to the commission - thus meeting another condition of the parliament.

This is the first time the parliament has the power to sign off on the EU's expenditures.

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