Griechenland-Wahl: Europas zweite Chance
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Griechenland hat gewählt, aber Europa ist damit noch lange nicht gerettet. Der Kontinent steht in den nächsten Wochen vor einer Richtungsentscheidung: Entweder die EU wächst jetzt endlich zusammen, oder das Projekt ist am Ende. Die Totengräber warten schon.

Wer braucht eigentlich Europa, den Euro, diesen andauernden Ärger mit den Griechen? Was soll das alles noch? Ein Land, elf Millionen Einwohner klein, führt den Rest des Staatenbunds monatelang vor. Jede Wahl in Hellas wird zur Zitterpartie für ganz Europa. Viele Griechen benehmen sich wie eine Gruppe Halbstarker, die in einem Club Party gemacht haben und jetzt empört sind, dass sie dafür eine Rechnung bezahlen sollen. Ja, geht's noch?

Wenn es gut läuft, wird Griechenland nach dem Wahlsieg von Antonis Samaras nun endlich eine Regierung bekommen. Aber Griechenland wird ein Problemfall bleiben, die politischen Verhältnisse sind instabil, Samaras ist ein politischer Wendehals, wenig zuverlässig. Es muss aber weiter gelten: Die neue Regierung in Athen darf mehr europäisches Geld nur erhalten, wenn die zugesagte Erneuerung des Landes und die Sparbeschlüsse umgesetzt werden. Anders wird Griechenland niemals aus dem Tief herauskommen. Ein Wanken darf sich Europa an dieser Stelle nicht erlauben, Ausnahmeregelungen für große und kleine Schuldensünder gab es in der Vergangenheit schon zu viele, sie haben uns diesen Euro-Ärger erst eingebrockt.

Aber es gilt auch: Die neue griechische Regierung braucht Unterstützung aus Europa. Griechenland braucht Hilfe, um seine Wirtschaft anzukurbeln, das Land braucht ein echtes Konjunkturprogramm. Und: Wenn der Zeitplan für die Umsetzung der Reformen verändert werden kann, dann soll er verändert werden. Der neue Regierungschef kann das als Erfolg verkaufen und wenigstens zum Teil sein Gesicht wahren. Sei's drum. Vielleicht hilft das, die Verhältnisse in Athen wieder zu stabilisieren. » | Ein Kommentar von Roland Nelles | Montag, 18. Juni 2012

Greek Election Favors Pro-Bailout Party
THE NEW YORK TIMES: ATHENS — Greek voters narrowly favored a pro-bailout party in parliamentary elections on Sunday, a result that is likely to calm world markets and ease fears that the country will leave the euro zone.

Official projections showed the conservative New Democracy party as coming in first, giving it the chance to collect enough support to form a pro-bailout coalition and keep Greece in the euro zone.

Late Sunday night, Alexis Tsipras, the leader of the leftist Syriza party, conceded the election and congratulated the conservative leader of New Democracy, Antonis Samaras. Syriza had called for a rejection of the loan deal that Greece had made with foreign creditors.

Though no party is expected to earn enough seats in the 300-member Parliament to form a government, official projections show that the two traditional parties — New Democracy and the socialist Pasok — would get enough seats to form a coalition. » | Rachel Donadio | Sunday, June 17, 2012

Greek Americans Brace for Vote on Euro
Greeks around the world are following what is considered to be their homeland's most critical vote in 40 years. In one city in the US State of Florida, Greeks say they are frustrated by the political turmoil in Greece. Al Jazeera's Andy Gallacher reports from Tarpon Springs.

Greeks Go to Polls on Euro's Day of Destiny
Voters face stark choice between rejecting austerity and risking ejection from euro, or accepting punishing rescue deal

Whatever Euro's Fate, Europe's Reputation Savaged
REUTERS INDIA: Whether the euro lives or dies, the chaotic way Europe has tackled the crisis could undermine the region's geopolitical clout for years to come and leave it at a distinct disadvantage in a rapidly changing world.

With an apparently never-ending series of last-minute summits and telephone calls, Europe's leaders and finance ministers have held the bloc together in the face of growing strains between states, a rising political backlash and market alarm.

But with hindsight, outsiders say each measure proved too little, too late. US officials in particular complain European leaders have either failed to grasp the scale of the problem or proved unwilling to countenance the awkward political decisions necessary to fix it.

As a result, they say, what should have been one of the most stable parts of the world has now become one of the most unpredictable.

At one extreme, the euro area might be about to embark on a journey towards further fiscal and political union as an almost totally unitary "super state". At the other, it could unravel and collapse into an unstable mess of regional rivalry.

"From almost every conversation I've had in the last year - with Chinese, with Indians, with just about anybody - the message is always the same," says Fiona Hill, a former senior officer for the US National Intelligence Council and now head of the Europe programme at Washington think tank the Brookings Institute. "Europe can no longer be trusted. It seems to be moving from being a source of stability to a driver of instability[.]"

Long-held certainties were being challenged, she said. Even non-euro member Britain suddenly appeared at risk of breaking up, with Scotland due to hold a referendum on independence that experts say could yet go either way. » | Peter Apps, Political Risk Correspondent | LONDON | Saturday, June 16, 2012

Greek Election Is Euro versus Drachma, Samaras Says
BBC: Sunday's Greek election is a choice between staying in the euro and going back to the drachma, the leader of the centre-right New Democracy party has told a final campaign rally in Athens.

The general election, the second in six weeks, is seen as crucial to Greece's future in the eurozone.

New Democracy broadly accepts the EU/IMF bailout of debt-laden Greece but wants changes to the terms.

Main opponents Syriza reject the terms of the bailout but back the euro.

Syriza surged into second place on 6 May, in an election that produced an inconclusive result, with no party or coalition able to form a government.

Unofficial opinion polls suggest a fall in support for anti-bailout parties.

Under Greek election law, official opinion polls are banned in the two weeks before the election. » | Friday, June 15, 2012

Golden Dawn Threatens Hospital Raids against Immigrants in Greece
THE GUARDIAN: Far-right party says it will throw immigrants and their children out on the street, as some hospitals run short of supplies

In an atmosphere that has become increasingly electric before Greece's crucial election, the far-right Golden Dawn has ratcheted up the rhetoric by threatening to remove immigrants and their children from hospitals and kindergartens.

Earning loud applause at an election campaign rally in Athens, Golden Dawn MP Ilias Panagiotaros said: "If Chrysi Avgi [Golden Dawn] gets into parliament [as polls predict], it will carry out raids on hospitals and kindergartens and it will throw immigrants and their children out on the street so that Greeks can take their place."

Medical supplies and beds at some hospitals are running desperately short. The governor of the state-run Nikea hospital, Theodoros Roupas, called on doctors to stop non-essential surgical interventions because of a critical shortage of gloves, syringes and gauze. The order was revoked when Roupas found emergency supplies later in the day.

"The situation is really critical and getting worse every day," said Dr Panaghiotis Papanikolaou, a neurosurgeon at the hospital. "There is not enough medical staff to cope and huge shortages of supplies. There's no money to even service scanners and surgical microscopes … we're talking about a major healthcare crisis – not in the making, it is happening now." » | Helena Smith in Athens | Tuesday, June 12, 2012

GUARDIAN VIDEO: Greece on the breadline: Jon Henley's euro debt tales » | Jon Henley, Alex Healey and Mustafa Khalili | Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Luxembourg PM: 'UK Will Become Euro Zone Member'
ITV NEWS: Luxembourg Prime Minister, Jean-Claude Juncker has predicted that the UK will eventually join the euro currency.

He told The Times [£] that the eurozone would emerge “stronger than ever” and the UK could soon become a member of the euro area. » | Saturday, June 09, 2012

The End Is Nigh for the Greek Euro
Germany’s Bild says it’s time for Greece to leave the euro. We’re in the endgame, says Nikolaus Blome. It’s as if the vultures were circling over the proud country, he says. The Greeks are plundering their banks of banknotes. Imports into Greece can no longer be insured. And there are continual rumours that drachmas have already been printed. The country is in decay. It can’t go on like this much longer. It’s time for one of the bosses of the Eurozone to tell the Greeks the truth. As hard as it sounds, writes Nikolaus Blome, the country needs to be built up anew, from the ground up. The Greeks need a new start in economics, politics, and administration. Just as in a developing country. The first step is for Greece to leave the euro.

'Sick Conditions': Why Greeks Will Vote for Tsipras

SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: Greeks have spurned the politicians who represent the country's broken system, and many are now following rising star Alexis Tsipras. The radical left-wing politician has pledged to free Greece from painful austerity measures while keeping the euro, but no one knows how he plans to fulfill his promises.

Alexis Tsipras, the man who will very likely emerge again as the winner of the upcoming Greek parliamentary election, is campaigning throughout the country primarily under one slogan: "We won't pay any more."

He doesn't say what would replace the "barbarism of the austerity dictates," which he maintains that the European Union partners, above all German Chancellor Angela Merkel, have forced upon his country. He argues that the Europeans are only bluffing -- and he promises that they will continue to help, even if the Greeks no longer service their debts. He says: Elect me and all this misery will come to an end.

Stavros Lygeros, 59, is sitting in a café in the posh Athens neighborhood Neo Psychiko. Lygeros is a political commentator and a bourgeois intellectual. He's endeavoring to explain why the Greeks are following Tsipras in droves, although this young politician is clearly a seductive new star and his successful radical left-wing Radical Left Coalition (Syriza) cannot explain who will pay the future salaries of civil servants, doctors and nurses. Lygeros says that many Syriza voters don't even believe that this party has a solution.

The tragedy is that Greeks don't really have a choice when they return to the polls on June 17 -- their only option is refusal and protest. Suddenly all of Europe is demanding that they vote once again for, of all people, the very politicians who brought them all this misery in the first place, namely the socialists under Evangelos Venizelos and the conservatives under Antonis Samaras.

Because the discredited parties stand for the loan agreement and the conditions laid down by the lenders, many Greeks see Tsipras as their only alternative. At 37, he is young compared to the usual gerontocrats who dominate Greek politics. With an annual income last year of €48,000 ($61,000), a motorcycle and a modest apartment, he's fairly poor for a politician, which is yet another factor that fuels his popularity among voters. And he's the only one who promises to free Greece from the yoke of the austerity measures -- yet retain the euro. » | Julia Amalia Heyer | Monday, May 21, 2012

Related »

Alexis Tsipras Warns Greek Crisis Is Also Europe's

THE GUARDIAN: Greece's leftwing leader tells Paris audience that other EU countries will be next if they fail to oppose radical austerity drive

The rising star of Europe Alexis Tsipras, the radical left Greek leader, has arrived in Paris to warn EU countries that their turn would come if they failed to oppose the radical austerity that is driving Greece to the brink of "collective suicide".

Tsipras, who is leading an austerity-backlash, said the future of Europe and the euro depended on the outcome of the Greece debt crisis. And he said he could feel a "wind of change" blowing across the continent that he hoped would lead to the "complete re-founding of Europe based on social cohesion and solidarity".

To continue down the path of austerity, he warned, would turn the Greek tragedy into an European catastrophe.

"Greece is a link in a chain. If it breaks it is not just the link that is broken but the whole chain. What people have to understand is that the Greek crisis concerns not just Greece but all European people so a common European solution has to be found," he told a press conference in Paris.

"The public debt crisis is hitting the south of Europe but it will soon hit central Europe. People have to realise that their own country could be threatened.

"We are here to explain to people in Europe that we have nothing against them. We are fighting the battle in Greece not just for the Greek people but for people in France, Germany and all European countries."

"I am not here to blackmail, I am here to mobilise," he said.

"Greece gave humanity democracy and today the Greek people will bring democracy back to Europe." » | Kim Willsher in Paris | Monday, May 21, 2012

Related »

Debatte um zweite Währung: Deutsche Bank will den Geuro für Griechenland
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Griechenland ist kaum noch in der Euro-Zone zu halten, auch wenn die meisten Krisenpolitiker sich genau dies wünschen. Nun macht der Chefvolkswirt der Deutschen Bank einen ungewöhnlichen Vorschlag: Das Land soll einfach zwei Währungen parallel nutzen - den Euro und den Geuro.

Hamburg - Thomas Mayer, der Chefvolkswirt der Deutschen Bank, hält die Einführung einer griechischen Parallelwährung zum Euro für möglich. Diese soll für den inländischen Zahlungsverkehr und die Bezahlung lebensnotwendiger Importe verwendet werden, heißt es in einem Bericht der Forschungsabteilung der Deutschen Bank. Name der neuen Währung: Geuro.

Hintergrund ist die Annahme, dass Griechenland kaum noch in der Euro-Zone zu halten ist. Eine Regierungsbildung im Land ist gerade gescheitert, Neuwahlen stehen an, bei diesen könnten Parteien die Mehrheit erringen, die ein Sparprogramm ablehnen. Die Hilfszahlungen an Griechenland dürften dann eingestellt werden, und das Land würde den Währungsraum wohl verlassen müssen.

Die meisten Ökonomen halten es allerdings für wahrscheinlich, dass Griechenland selbst nach einem Euro-Austritt noch Hilfen anderer EU-Länder erhalten würde. Denn ein völliges Chaos mitten in Europa würden die anderen Länder definitiv vermeiden wollen.

Hier setzt Mayers Vorschlag an: Seinem Modell nach würde die griechische Regierung ihre Rechnungen wohl mit Schuldscheinen bezahlen. Diese würden zum Kern einer neuen Währung werden, da die Schuldscheine weiterverkauft werden könnten. » | ssu | Montag, 21. Mai 2012

Related »

Greek Leftist Leader Alexis Tsipras: 'It's a War between People and Capitalism'

THE GUARDIAN: Greece's eurozone fate may now be in the hands of the 37-year-old political firebrand and his Syriza party

"I don't believe in heroes or saviours," says Alexis Tsipras, "but I do believe in fighting for rights … no one has the right to reduce a proud people to such a state of wretchedness and indignity."

The man who holds the fate of the euro in his hands – as the leader of the Greek party willing to tear up the country's €130bn (£100bn) bailout agreement – says Greece is on the frontline of a war that is engulfing Europe.

A long bombardment of "neo-liberal shock" – draconian tax rises and remorseless spending cuts – has left immense collateral damage. "We have never been in such a bad place," he says, sleeves rolled up, staring hard into the middle distance, from behind the desk that he shares in his small parliamentary office. "After two and a half years of catastrophe Greeks, are on their knees. The social state has collapsed, one in two youngsters is out of work, there are people leaving en masse, the climate psychologically is one of pessimism, depression, mass suicides."

But while exhausted and battle weary, the nation at the forefront of Europe's escalating debt crisis and teetering on the edge of bankruptcy is also hardened. And, increasingly, they are looking towards Tsipras to lead their fight.

"Defeat is the battle that isn't waged," says the young politician who almost overnight has seen his radical left coalition party, Syriza, jump from representing fewer than 5% of Greeks to enjoying ratings of more than 25% in polls.

"You ask me if I am afraid. I'd be afraid if we continued on this path, a path to social hell … when someone fights there is a big chance that he will win and we are fighting this to win."

Before Greeks went to the polls on 6 May, neither Tsipras nor his party were a name to be reckoned with. If anything both were the butt of vague mockery: a former pony-tailed student communist leading a rag-tag band of ex-Trotskyists, Maoists, champagne socialists and greens. Tsipras's assistants – wielding Louis Vuitton bags and fashionable sunglasses – readily admit they are signed up "militants" mostly of the anti-globalisation cause. » | Helena Smith in Athens | Friday, May 18, 2012

Related »

"Trust Me," Greece Will Not Leave Euro: Greek MP
May 17 - As Greece counts down to its next election, one of the country's youngest MPs shares her thoughts on the Left, the Right and the chances of a euro exit.


Related »

Greece to Hold New Elections
Greek politicians have failed to form a government and will now head towards holding a new election. Polls show the vote could favour the country's leftists who want to renege on the terms of bailout agreed on by the government earlier in the year. This will see the country push closer towards an exit from the eurozone, a situation which IMF chief Christine Lagarde says could get "quite messy". Al Jazeera's Paul Brennan reports from Athens.

Related material here and here

Greece Calls New Election After Coalition Talks Fail

REUTERS.COM: Greece abandoned a nine-day hunt for a government on Tuesday and called a new election that threatens to hasten the nation's slide towards bankruptcy and a future outside the euro zone.

An inconclusive election on May 6 left parliament split between supporters and opponents of a 130 billion euro bailout deal which is reviled by Greeks for imposing deep wage, pension and public spending cuts.

A second election is expected to produce a similarly divided parliament, with opponents of the EU/IMF rescue consolidating their gains and raising the likelihood of an anti-bailout coalition that reneges on the deal keeping Greece afloat.

"For God's sake, let's move towards something better and not something worse," Socialist leader Evangelos Venizelos told reporters after a meeting of party leaders failed to agree on a government of technocrats. "Our motherland can find its way, we will fight for it to find its way."

European leaders have said they will halt the aid if promises given in return for the bailout are not kept. If so, Greece could go bankrupt as early as next month. Analysts say that this will almost certainly herald a Greek return to its drachma national currency. » | Lefteris Papadimas and Dina Kyriakidou | ATHENS | Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Verbunden »

Griechenland soll den Euro behalten

Related »

Merkel Tells Greece to Back Cuts or Face Euro Exit

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Greece may be forced to leave the euro if the country refuses to implement spending cuts agreed with the European Union, Angela Merkel warned.

Raising the spectre of a Greek exit, the German chancellor said “solidarity for the euro” was threatened by the on[-]going political crisis in Athens.

Stock markets around the world fell sharply with fears mounting that a euro break-up could lead to renewed financial turmoil. The FTSE-100 index of Britain’s major companies fell by two per cent to 5465, with bank shares hit particularly hard.

The cost of Spanish government borrowing also hit a record high since the single currency was introduced because of concerns that the crisis will spread.

Today, François Hollande, the new French president, will be sworn in and, in an indication of the concern gripping Europe, will almost immediately travel to Berlin to hold talks with Mrs Merkel that will be dominated by Greece’s plight.

Attempts to form a new government in Athens have been thwarted for the past nine days, although the country’s president will meet all major parties this afternoon to discuss the forming of a “technocratic” administration rather than a coalition.

An out[-]going Greek minister warned that the country could descend into “civil war” amid the chaos of a euro exit. “If Greece cannot meet its obligations and serve its debt the pain will be great,” Michalis Chrysohoidis was quoted as telling a local radio station. “What will prevail are armed gangs with Kalashnikovs and which one has the greatest number of Kalashnikovs will count … we will end up in civil war.” » | Robert Winnett, David Blair and Bruno Waterfield | Monday, May 14, 2012

Related »

Anti-bailout Bloc to Shun Greek Crisis Talks
Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras says he will not join Monday's last round of coalition talks convened by president.

Related »

Time to Admit Defeat: Greece Can No Longer Delay Euro Zone Exit

SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: After Greek voters rejected austerity in last week's election, plunging the country into a political crisis, Europe has been searching for a Plan B for Greece. It's time to admit that the EU/IMF rescue plan has failed. Greece's best hopes now lie in a return to the drachma. By SPIEGEL Staff

There are many things Alexis Tsipras likes about Germany. The leader of Greece's Coalition of the Radical Left (Syriza) party drives his BMW motorcycle to work at the Greek parliament in the morning, Germany's über-leftist Oskar Lafontaine is one of his political allies, and when it comes to his daily work, his colleagues have noticed a certain tendency toward Prussian-style perfection.

Tsipras could easily count as a friend of the Germans, if it weren't for the German chancellor. Greek magazines have frequently caricatured Angela Merkel dressed in a Nazi uniform, because she imposes her fondness for balanced budgets and austerity on the rest of Europe. The Greeks, says Tsipras, want to "put an end" to the Germans' requirements and their "brutal austerity policy."

Tsipras is the new political star in Athens. While the country's washed-up mainstream parties struggled for days to form a new government, the clever young politician has been dominating the headlines with his coalition movement of Trotskyites, anarchists and leftist socialists.

In the recent elections, Tsipras' Syriza party advanced to become the second-largest political force in the country, and Tsipras is making sure his gray-faced opponents from the Greek political establishment know it. Surrounded by cameras and microphones, he stood in the Athens government district last Tuesday, put on his winner's smile and called upon the two traditional parties, the center-left Socialists (PASOK) and the conservative New Democracy, to send a letter "to the EU leadership" and cancel the bailout deal that Athens made with the EU and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Tsipras knows what many Greeks are thinking. At the end of last week, his poll numbers rose to a new record level of almost 28 percent.

Turning Point

Two years after the government in Athens requested the first emergency loans in Brussels, the European debt crisis is reaching a turning point. Europe and the international community pumped about €240 billion ($312 billion) into the Balkan nation, government employees were let go, pensions were slashed and a series of restructuring programs were approved.

But even though the country is virtually being governed by the European Commission and the IMF, Greece's debts are higher than ever and the recession is worsening. As the political situation becomes increasingly chaotic, new elections seem all the more likely.

At the Chancellery in Berlin, the television images from Athens now remind Merkel's advisers of conditions in the ill-fated Weimar Republic of 1919-1933. Back then, the Germans perceived the Treaty of Versailles as a supposed "disgrace." Now, the Greeks feel the same way about the austerity measures imposed by Brussels. And, as in the 1920s in Germany, the situation in Greece today benefits fringe parties on both the left and the right. The country's political system is unraveling, and some advisers even fear that the tense situation could lead to a military coup.

Greece has been in intensive care for years, but the patient, instead of recovering, is just getting sicker and sicker. In a confidential report, which SPIEGEL has seen, experts from the IMF arrive at a devastating verdict. The country, they write, has only "a small industrial base" and is characterized by "structural incrustations" and an "excessively large role of the public sector." » | SPIEGEL Staff | Monday, May 14, 2012