David Cameron reportedly ready to leave EU if Juncker elected chief
British prime minister quoted as saying he can't guarantee UK membership under the rightist
British Prime Minister David Cameron has warned he would no longer be able to guarantee that Britain would remain a member of the European Union if European leaders elect Jean-Claude Juncker as European Commission chief, Germany's Der Spiegel magazine reported.
The European Commission president is selected by EU leaders but must be approved by the assembly, where Eurosceptics from the right made gains in last week's election. The European People's Party, which won the most seats in the vote, chose former Luxembourg prime minister Juncker as its candidate.
In a pre-publication copy of an article, Der Spiegel said Cameron had made his warning on the sidelines of an EU summit starting in Brussels tomorrow, saying that if Juncker became commission president, he would no longer be able to ensure Britain's continued EU membership.
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The magazine said participants understood Cameron's comments to mean that a majority vote for Juncker could destabilise his government to the extent that an "in-out" referendum would have to be brought forward.
That, in turn, would most likely lead to the British people voting to quit the EU, it reported.
A spokesman at the prime minister's office declined to comment on the magazine article.
But Juncker called on the majority of leaders not to bow to pressure from the minority in their decision, according to an advance extract of an article that was due to be published in Germany's Bild am Sonntag newspaper yesterday.