Alex Pigman, a Brussels-based journalist working for AFP, highlighted the deep divisions and bickering which has erupted between key players in the EU27 in recent days, in a series of tweets in which he dissected the strategies of several member states. The Netherlands, he suggested, were vehemently opposed to the concept of the eurozone, the monetary union of 19 EU countries which have adopted the euro as their currency, issuing eurobonds, a system whereby debt would be issued collectively, across the bloc, rather than to individual member states. Critics - most notably Dutch finance minister Wopke Hoekstra - believed the end result would be rampant, uncontrolled spending in southern European countries hardest hit by COVID-19, the cost of which northern countries would be required to share.