LUXEMBOURG (AP) — Euro finance ministers on Thursday agreed on broad guidelines on how to use the bloc’s permanent bailout fund to rescue banks from failure, delivering on a long-promised goal to stabilize the bloc’s financial system.

Enabling the 500 billion euro ($670 billion) rescue fund to shore up struggling banks directly is a pillar of the 17-nation eurozone’s so-called banking union, which seeks to hand European institutions the job of supervision and rescue rather than leaving weaker member states to fend for themselves.

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