Categorie: PhpList

Greece crisis: ‘What kind of Europe is this that uses the euro as a tool of submission?’

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

“Going back to a national currency, my God, that will be a huge setback,” says a woman, walking away from the Alpha Bank cash machine off Syntagma Square near the Greek parliament in Athens. Her bid to withdraw euros has been unsuccessful: cash has dried up at the ATM.

After the Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s shock announcement to call a referendum this weekend, queues have started lining up outside banks in Athens, lending credence to fears of a renewed “run” on Greek banks. Near Syntagma Square, Greeks continued to line up outside ATMs in an effort to withdraw some savings to help with payments as uncertainty remained about whether banks would open today.

Dimitrios Dedes, a retired military serviceman, was queuing outside the Ethniki Bank, the National Bank of Greece, further down from Syntagma. The 55-year-old said he would only withdraw some cash for daily expenses. How will he vote in Saturday’s referendum? he was asked. “No,” he says.

“We must chase fear away and gain our sovereignty back. What kind of Europe is this? It is using the euro as a tool of submission. A country’s strength is reflected by its independent flag flying high and control over its national currency – it’s time we regain our currency before we lose both.”

Lees verder op The Independent >>>

The blame game has begun

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

A hundred and one years ago on Sunday, gun shots rang out in a city in southern Europe. Few at the time paid much heed to the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife as they drove through the streets of Sarajevo. Within six weeks, however, Europe was at war.

Make no mistake, the decision by Alexis Tsipras to hold a referendum on the bailout terms being demanded of his country has the potential to be a Sarajevo moment. The crisis is not just about whether there is soon to be a bank run in Greece, although there is certainly the threat of one. It is not just about whether the creditors overplayed their hand in the negotiations, although they did. It is about the future of the euro itself.
Greek banks to stay closed on Monday
Read more

There will be much talk in the next few days about how Greece can be quarantined. The three people who have been leading the negotiations for the troika – Christine Lagarde of the International Monetary Fund, Jean-Claude Juncker of the European commission and Mario Draghi of the European Central Bank – can still cling to the hope that Tsipras will lose the referendum next Sunday.

In those circumstances, the Syriza-led coalition would have little choice but to hold an election. The return of a government headed by, for example, the centre-right New Democracy, would open up the possibility that Athens would sue for peace on the terms demanded by the troika.

There is, however, no guarantee of this. The troika was certain last week that Tsipras would fold when presented with a final take-it-or-leave-it offer. They were wrong. The Fund, the ECB and the European commission made a fatal misjudgement and have now lost control of events.

Lees deze column van Larry Elliott verder op The Guardian >>>

The moral crusade against Greece must be opposed

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

The idea that Greece partly deserves its fate reflects an order in which wealth trumps democracy. We should fight a narrative that enfeebles us all.

‘This is our political alternative to neoliberalism and to the neoliberal process of European integration: democracy, more democracy and even deeper democracy,” said Alexis Tsipras on 18 January 2014 in a debate organised by the Dutch Socialist party in Amersfoort. Now the moment of deepest democracy looms, as the Greek people go to the polls on Sunday to vote for or against the next round of austerity.

Unfortunately, Sunday’s choice will be between endless austerity and immediate chaos. As comfortable as it is to argue from the sidelines that maybe Grexit in the medium term won’t hurt as much as 30 years’ drag on GDP from swingeing repayments, no sane person wants either. The vision that Syriza swept to power on was that if you spoke truth to the troika plainly and in broad daylight, they would have to acknowledge that austerity was suffocating Greece.

They have acknowledged no such thing. Whatever else one could say about the handling of the crisis, and whatever becomes of the euro, Sunday will be the moment that unstoppable democracy meets immovable supra-democracy. The Eurogroup has already won: the Greek people can vote any way they like – but what they want, they cannot have.

Lees verder op The Guardian >>>

Greece crisis: a disaster for Athens and a colossal failure for the EU

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

After three crises in as many days, the collective performance of the eurozones governments inspires little hope or confidence in their crisis management.

Five years from its inception, the world’s biggest bailout of a sovereign state will grind to an excruciating halt on Tuesday, theoretically leaving Greece high and dry and on its own under a leftwing government bitterly accusing the EU elite of deliberately using the country as a neo-liberal laboratory.

If the experiment has been a disaster for Greece, it is also a colossal failure for Europe, with the result that at the very apex of leadership the EU nowadays resembles an unhappy assembly of squabbling politicians locked in what could not be called an “ever closer union”.

Take just the last few days. On Thursday leaders at a summit contemplated formally for the first time, however briefly, the prospect of Britain leaving the EU. By three o’clock on Friday morning they were all at one another’s throats in an unseemly quarrel over who should take part in accommodating a mere 40,000 refugees from Italy and Greece over two years, and on what terms. On Saturday, 18 governments of the eurozone cut Greece off and initiated a process that could end in pushing Athens out of the currency and perhaps out of the union.

Three days, three crises, and a collective performance that inspires little hope or confidence in their crisis management.

The air is already thick with recrimination, not just between Greece and the rest of Europe, but among the Europeans. France says that Greece must be saved, Germany says impossible. The European commission is seeking to revive negotiation that are on their deathbed. The Finnish finance minister, Alex Stubb, is looking forward to the funeral. The International Monetary Fund is at odds with the Europeans over the levels of Greek debt.

Everywhere there is the sight of leaders seeking to escape responsibility for a sorry state of affairs.

Lees verder op The Guardian >>>

Dit is er gisteren wel gebeurd op de EU-top

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

The Eurogroup Meeting of 27th June 2015 will not go down as a proud moment in Europe’s history. Ministers turned down the Greek government’s request that the Greek people should be granted a single week during which to deliver a Yes or No answer to the institutions’ proposals – proposals crucial for Greece’s future in the Eurozone. The very idea that a government would consult its people on a problematic proposal put to it by the institutions was treated with incomprehension and often with disdain bordering on contempt. I was even asked: “How do you expect common people to understand such complex issues?”. Indeed, democracy did not have a good day in yesterday’s Eurogroup meeting! But nor did European institutions. After our request was rejected, the Eurogroup President broke with the convention of unanimity (issuing a statement without my consent) and even took the dubious decision to convene a follow up meeting without the Greek minister, ostensibly to discuss the “next steps”.

Can democracy and a monetary union coexist? Or must one give way? This is the pivotal question that the Eurogroup has decided to answer by placing democracy in the too-hard basket. So far, one hopes.

Intervention by Yanis Varoufakis, 27th June 2015 Eurogroup Meeting

Colleagues,

In our last meeting (25th June) the institutions tabled their final offer to the Greek authorities, in response to our proposal for a Staff Level Agreement (SLA) as tabled on 22nd June (and signed by Prime Minister Tsipras). After long, careful examination, our government decided that, unfortunately, the institutions’ proposal could not be accepted. In view of how close we have come to the 30th June deadline, the date when the current loan agreement expires, this impasse of grave concern to us all and its causes must be thoroughly examined.

Lees en kijk verder op de blog van Yanis Varoufakis >>>

Met Grexit wint de beschaving

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

Griekenland, keer terug naar de drachme en herover de zeggenschap over je eigen samenleving.

Alexis Tsipras werd premier van Griekenland met een kansloze belofte: stoppen met de bezuinigingen die de eurogroep dicteerde, maar doorgaan met de euro. Inmiddels heeft de Eurogroep duidelijk gemaakt dat doorgaan met de euro betekent buigen voor de wil van de politieke as Berlijn-Parijs-Brussel, gesteund door de immer politiek opererende ECB.

De Eurogroep en de ECB hebben Griekenland een gemene streek geleverd. Het ‘reddingspakket’ in 2010 lenigde de nood van Franse en Duitse banken, niet de nood van Griekenland. Daarom is het begrijpelijk dat de huidige Griekse regering eist dat een deel van de schuld uit dat pakket wordt kwijtgescholden. Terecht concludeerde een commissie van het Griekse parlement onlangs dat de leningen die vorige Griekse regeringen afsloten bij het IMF en de Europese Unie niet het belang van de natie dienden en daarom niet legitiem en niet afdwingbaar zijn. De schuld is even ongeldig als een contract dat een burger onder dwang tekent.

Toen de EU in 2010 dicteerde dat de Grieken hun schuld zouden terugbetalen door radicaal te bezuinigen kon je het resultaat voorspellen: verzwakking van het bedrijfsleven, verarming van de bevolking, vernieling van de samenleving en verergering van het schuldprobleem. Tsipras heeft een punt als hij het IMF beticht van crimineel gedrag en zijn Europese redders verwijt Griekenland te plunderen.

Helaas praat hij tegen dovemansoren.

Lees deze column van Bruno de Haas verder op de Volkskrant >>>

ECB handhaaft noodsteun voor Griekse banken

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

De Europese Centrale Bank (ECB) handhaaft de omvang van de noodsteun voor Griekse banken op het niveau van afgelopen vrijdag. Dat maakte de ECB zondag bekend. De centrale bank staat paraat om het besluit ten aanzien van de noodsteun opnieuw onder de loep te nemen, als dat noodzakelijk is. De ECB houdt de situatie in Griekenland naar eigen zeggen nauwgezet in de gaten.

Daarbij wordt onverminderd samengewerkt met de centrale bank van Griekenland, zei ECB-president Mario Draghi. Hij benadrukte verder dat de eurolanden zaterdag hebben beloofd al het mogelijke te zullen doen om de kracht van hun muntunie te verdedigen.

De Griekse centralebankpresident Yannis Stournaras zei in het persbericht van de ECB dat zijn centrale bank alle maatregelen zal treffen die noodzakelijk zijn om de financiële stabiliteit voor Griekse burgers te garanderen. Die stabiliteit is in gevaar gekomen door de grote onzekerheid over de economische toekomst van Griekenland.

Lees verder op de Volkskrant >>>

A continent sinking under debt

Geplaatst op by 0 reacties

In the world of brinkmanship, endgames and last minute concessions that have come to define Greece’s relationship with Europe, we can see the blueprint of an abusive relationship.

In his book Governing by Debt, Maurizio Lazzarato argues that the creditor-debtor centred politics of contemporary capitalism is substantially different from the capital-labour centred politics of post-war capitalism. In fact, to understand what is at stake in contemporary Europe we need to approach debt in its totality – government, corporate, financial and household debt. We have to recognise that the debt relationship is not merely an economic relationship of money owed and collected, but a deeply political relationship of power exercised by one person or institution over another.

Consider the following graph. It shows the total debt by sector in selected EU countries at the end of 2014.

Referendum EU Associatieverdrag Oekraïne

When debt is seen in its totality a different picture emerges from the one usually portrayed by the media. The total debts of the Netherlands and Ireland are nearly seven times their GDP, Denmark’s is 5.5 times and the UK’s more than four times. How sustainable in the long run are the levels of non-government debt in these countries? Is the exceptionally low exposure of the Greek financial sector to debt an indicator that its liabilities have been disguised as Greek government debt? And how sustainable is household debt?

Years of austerity have resulted in European families sinking under debt while experiencing increasing job insecurity, reductions in pensions and the gradual privatisation of welfare services and education.

These different types of debt are not independent from one other. They are mutually constitutive. Behind them are numerous creditor-debtor relations between actors with often diametrically opposed interests and unequal power: states, corporations, banks, financial institutions, small businesses, voters.

This “system” of European debt interacts with a global financial architecture, dominated by the demands of the financial sector. Far from being prudent, this sector is itself exposed to colossal amounts of debt-related risk, endangering all other sectors.

Lees verder op The Conversation >>>