EU lengthens list of countries set for negative growth

BRUSSELS - A third of the 27 countries in the European Union will see their economies contract in 2012 and that downward trend will result in stagnant economic growth for the group, an EU report said on Thursday.

The prospects were bad enough to lead the EU to even lower its forecast for Germany, which is usually considered to be the economic powerhouse among the group members. The EU predicted that Germany will only see economic growth of 0.6 percent this year, far below the 3 percent growth it had in 2011.

In a previous report, the EU predicted that only Greece and Portugal would see negative growth in 2012. Now, though, it has made the same forecast for Belgium, Spain, Italy, Cyprus, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Hungary.