Barack Obama backs David Cameron over 'fixing' UK's relationship with EU [View all]

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Source: The Guardian

Barack Obama has thrown David Cameron a lifeline in his battle with the Conservative party over Europe by saying it would be wrong to abandon the EU before Britain has attempted to renegotiate its membership terms.

In an endorsement of the prime minister's message to his party over the last 48 hours, after Michael Gove said Britain could benefit from being outside the EU, the US president said it made "some sense" to try and fix the problem before leaving.

But Obama, who described Britain's EU membership as an "expression of its influence" around the world, offered a mixed judgment on the prime minister's plan to renegotiate Britain's EU membership terms after the next election. The president said he would wait to see if the negotiations succeed before making a final judgment.

But Downing Street was delighted when Obama, who appeared to have been briefed in some detail about No 10's current EU woes, rejected out of hand the suggestion that Britain should leave the EU now. One aide said: "Most powerful man on earth supports the PM's position."

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/may/13/barack-obama-david-cameron-uk