Slovak Lawmakers Back Early Elections Needed for EFSF

Slovakia’s parliament approved a bill on early elections, meeting the opposition’s condition for it to back an overhaul of the European bailout mechanism.

Lawmakers voted 143 to 3 with no abstentions to hold elections on March 10, more than two years before a regularly scheduled ballot in June 2014. The move follows the fall of Premier Iveta Radicova’s government, which lost a confidence motion tied to an Oct. 11 vote on enhancing the European Financial Stability Facility, the region’s temporary bailout fund.