All EU countries should adopt euro: Barroso

(BERLIN) - The head of the European Commission Manuel Barroso said on Wednesday that all EU countries should adopt the euro, amid gloomy predictions that the raging debt crisis could spell the end of the common currency.

"Belonging to the euro area or thriving towards it should define the EU," Barroso said in Berlin. "The EU as a whole and the euro area belong together and should not be divided."

"The challenge is how to further deepen euro area integration without creating divisions with those who are not yet in it," he said. "A split union will not work."

"Our goal must not be to restore the status quo ante, but to move on to something new and better. For that to happen, we need a stability union, but also a solidarity union," he said.

"Provided there is enough political will, the greatest emerging power in the world will be the EU," he said.

Amid growing grumblings at Europe's grassroots that politicians have messed up the EU, observers say that some countries may abandon the euro while opposition grows against joining the 17-nation single currency by countries not yet inside.