BRUSSELS, March 8 (Xinhuanet) -- European Union (EU) finance ministers on Tuesday failed to agree on how much they should change the EU stability pact, despite marathon talks beginning Monday afternoon.

    An extraordinary EU finance ministers Council meeting will now take place on March 20, announced by Luxembourg's Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, whose country holds the EU presidency.

    He also refused to rule out that the EU will not after all revise the pact, saying that "I do not rule out that we stick withthe pact as it is".

    "It is a pact which works badly, but I have no wish to replace a pact which is doing badly with a pact which gives the impressionof working but which will go badly later," he said.

    France and Germany, who repeatedly broke borrowing limits set by the pact, have called for the pact to be modified.

    The two want some spending, such as the funding of long-term economic reform, to be excluded from the pact. However, smaller countries that have kept to the rules have opposed the move.

    The dispute has raised concerns of a rift when EU leaders meet for talks later in March.

    The Stability and Growth Pact was designed to safeguard the euro after its launch in 1999 by guaranteeing that governments would not overspend and plunge their country into deficit. Enditem