Matteo Renzi and David Cameron buddy up | OLIVIER MORIN/AFP/Getty Italy backs David Cameron’s call for EU reform Italian and British foreign ministers wrote a joint op-ed arguing for a more flexible Europe.

Italy has publicly backed U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron's call for a more flexible Europe.

The Italian and British foreign ministers, Paolo Gentiloni and Philip Hammond, wrote a joint op-ed in the Telegraph Monday arguing that “only by accommodating both federalists and free-traders will Europe be fit for the future.”

“Italy and the UK agree on the need for a deep reform of the EU, simplifying its functioning, its procedures and its rules,” they wrote. Such reforms would prepare the EU for “new international challenges," the op-ed states.

The move is a boost for Cameron who will try to gather support for his EU reforms at a leader’s summit in Brussels this week. Britain is in the process of negotiating terms of its EU membership ahead of a referendum which is due by the end of 2017. More flexibility is one of Cameron’s core demands.

“While the UK holds the single market as its main focus, Italy’s position is inspired by the vision of a federal EU and ever-closer integration, both economically and politically,” they wrote.

The way to reconcile different visions of the EU among the member states is to “embrace a new model of its functioning, based on the flexibility to manage greater or lesser integration.”