Germany's constitutional court on Tuesday cleared the way for the establishment of the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), after it ruled that Germany's contribution to the Greek and other eurozone emergency plans did not violate the parliament's budget autonomy.

The Bundesverfassungsgericht, Germany's federal constitutional court, was asked to assess whether the authorisation to give guarantees of approximately €170 billion ($238 billion) was within the capacity of the federal budget, and