Before his departure, Trichet describes ongoing challenges

In an interview in German weekly Bild am Sonntag on the last day of his eight-year stint at the helm of the ECB, Jean-Claude Trichet urged eurozone governments to stick to their promises and bring down unsustainable debt piles.

“The crisis is not over. It has laid bare the weaknesses of advanced economies. We are now seeing the weaknesses of the U.S. and Japanese economies, but also, of course, Europe's weaknesses,” said Trichet.

In a make-or-break summit on Wednesday that stretched well into Thursday morning, European leaders agreed to a series of measures they hope will put an end to the worst economic crisis in the eurozone's history.

They persuaded banks to take heavy losses on their holdings of Greek debt, increased the amount of core capital lenders must hold and boosted their bailout fund to one trillion euros to prevent the crisis from spreading.

Financial markets greeted the accord with euphoria, with the main German stock exchange up more than 5 percent the day after.

“The decisions taken at the summit meeting need to be implemented with great precision and speed,” said Trichet, adding that national capitals “now have some hard work ahead of them.”

“Swift and full implementation of those decisions is now absolutely critical. We will monitor this process very carefully. Now is the time for action,” said the 68-year-old.

As a response to the crisis, Trichet proposed closer co-operation between the 17 countries that share the euro currency.

“I would say — as a citizen of Europe, not as president of the ECB — that we could proceed in the direction of significantly stronger European governance with well-defined responsibilities,” said the Frenchman.

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