In view of the recent turbulence on Europe's stock markets the daily newspaper Diário de Notícias criticises Berlin's obstructive behaviour: "The risk premiums on Spanish (and Italian) bonds are climbing to record levels - despite the horrifying austerity package Berlin and Brussels have foisted on Madrid in exchange for approving assistance for Spain's banks. Regions like Valencia are bankrupt and need help from the central government. At the same time [Jens] Weidmann, the cynic who heads the Bundesbank, is pushing for Spain to apply for a complete bailout. What terrible cruelty! The EFSF has been reduced to small change, and the new euro bailout fund [the ESM] will be subject to the scrutiny of Germany's Constitutional Court at least until September 12. Meanwhile the ECB is still refusing to buy government bonds on the secondary market. To promise something that doesn't exist is the worst insult to those who need it. The silence of the cowards continues in most of Europe's capitals." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Greece puts the Eurozone to the test, » Spain in the banking crisis, » The row over debt mutualisation

If the European Central Bank (ECB) doesn't intervene now to halt the escalating European debt crisis the monetary union is doomed, warns Roberto Napoletano in the liberal-conservative business paper II Sole 24 Ore: "The European Central Bank must do its bit to rescue the euro - and do it now. A radical shift in thinking is required because the Greek crisis has taught us that it's not enough to announce the limited purchase of government bonds. It must be made clear to the financial markets that there are no limits to either the power or the resources of the ECB. If we find the courage and the energy to do this, we will save the euro. If not, no one, I repeat no one, will have anything to smile about because sooner or later even the so-called AAA countries will pay a heavy price for the destruction they have caused with their short-sightedness. … The excuse that the ECB lacks the powers for such intervention doesn't apply, because the imperative of protecting the Eurozone gives the Bank the necessary authority. The Bundesbank, too, will be forced to recognise this." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Ways out of the debt crisis, » Greece puts the Eurozone to the test, » Spain in the banking crisis

There is no reason why Spain should still be under such pressure from the financial markets after its government implemented the recent austerity package, according to the conservative daily El Mundo, which calls for the ECB to step in: "It's irrational that [the financial markets] should ignore the Spanish government's reforms. So we must turn our attention to Germany and the ECB. It's up to them to put an end to this pressure which is battering our nation. Germany cannot hide behind a contradiction: on the one hand endorsing euro loans, on the other allowing Spain to totter on the edge of the abyss. The only explanation is that Germany intends to sever itself from a number of EU states. And say goodbye to an EU which is suffering under the design flaw of having no financial institution to assume ultimate responsibility. Merkel must allow [ECB president] Draghi to exert an influence over the markets, as he did for the second time months ago, and alleviate this unbearable situation." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Ways out of the debt crisis, » Spain in the banking crisis

The record yields on Spanish bonds prompt the chief economist of Poland's Invest Bank, Wiktor Wojciechowski, to paint a gloomy picture of the global economy: "The risk premium on Spanish bonds, which has reached a record high, reflects to a certain extent the anxiety felt all over the world right now. I fear that the 100 billion euros promised to the Spanish banking sector won't be enough to stabilise the situation. Therefore Prime Minister Rajoy's government will likely have to ask for further assistance from the EU institutions in its bid to fight the worsening recession. A decision on this could come at the beginning of 2013, but if the yields on the bonds remain as high as they are now it will come sooner. The situation in Spain is diametrically opposed to that in Greece, because there the main problem is the public debt that needs restructuring. … The rapid rise in public debt is also a problem in Spain, but far more ominous is the threat emanating from private sector debt, which has risen to more than twice the country's GDP." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Spain in the banking crisis

US President Barack Obama has issued a warning to Syria about committing the "tragic mistake" of using chemical weapons. Behind the scenes, however the US has long been pulling strings to "gently" topple Syria's President Bashar al-Assad, according to the liberal daily Corriere del Ticino: "Since the diplomatic solution has definitively failed, Washington is working behind the scenes and pulling strings on two fronts, with the opposition and with the allied nations Israel and Turkey, to get them to help oust Assad. All on tiptoes, because the last thing the US government needs now is a military operation. Obama cannot afford the luxuries of his predecessors... But he can afford an emergency plan firstly to help secure the chemical weapons arsenal before Assad uses it against the rebels, as Saddam did with the Kurds. And secondly to prevent the violence from escalating on both sides of the conflict and turning Syria into the scene of a mass extermination." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Civil war raging in Syria

The Russian girl punk band Pussy Riot went on trial last week for singing a protest song against Vladimir Putin in Moscow's Christ the Redeemer Cathedral last February. The young women have been ordered to remain in custody until January 2013. This over-reaction points to an unhealthy proximity between Church and state, according to the left-liberal daily De Volkskrant: "The Russian Orthodox Church is using Putin to protect its privileged status in Russia, to underscore its role as father of the nation. Two years ago the organisers of an exhibition that was deemed blasphemous by the Church fell victim to this unholy alliance. They were made to pay a huge fine. Now the members of a punk band are facing seven years in prison. They have been accused of inciting religious hatred. But it actually looks as if the Church and the state regard their protest as a double insult – to God and Putin – which deserves severe punishment." (24/07/2012)

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All available articles from » Bert Lanting

In the run-up to the referendum on the dismissal of Romanian President Traian Băsescu next Sunday, a bitter fight is raging between his supporters and his opponents, who are increasingly resorting to criminal charges instead of arguments. This is the wrong approach, according to political scientist  Alina Mungiu-Pippidi on the Ziare.com blog platform: "This is simply not normal. Aside from the fact that God has punished us with a political class that regularly commits criminal acts, it is not normal to use the threat of criminal justice as a political strategy. These fabricated charges cast a shadow over genuine ones, and the courts are overwhelmed with lawsuits that are entirely politically motivated and in which - no matter what sentences are passed - one political camp will say that the other controls the justice system. It is not normal when instead of five genuine charges against five top politicians, you now have 50. Ultimately this is a propaganda strategy that relativises and trivialises crime." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Power struggle in Romania

The Cuban dissident Oswaldo Payá was killed in a car crash on Sunday night. His daughter suspects the accident was planned. Payá was nominated three times for the Nobel Peace Prize by former Czech president Václav Havel. The business paper Hospodářské noviny pays him tribute in an obituary: "He united the Cuban opposition with a 2002 petition reminiscent of Charter 77 [the petition against the government of Czechoslovakia and the resulting civic initiative]. Since childhood Payá had been a hard nut to crack for the communist regime particularly because of his strong Catholic faith. As a soldier he refused to escort political prisoners. This cost him three years in a labour camp. Twice he tried to run as an independent candidate in elections. He was banned. Like Havel, he could have become a key figure in Cuba's transition to democracy. But Payá didn't want to rely on foreign support." (24/07/2012)

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In Estonia, Silver Meikar, a former MP for the liberal Reform Party, declared two months ago that his party had received anonymous donations. The conservative daily Postimees laments that other politicians seem to want to sit out the affair and wait until the fuss has died down: "If the Silvergate [affair] isn't cleared up it will not just damage the integrity of the parties but also put the work of the government in a bad light, which is trying to sweep the whole thing under the carpet and carry on as normal. … The Reform Party is not even willing to admit that there is a problem with donations. The main suspect in the affair, Justice Minister Kristen Michal, is still sitting smugly in his office convinced that nothing can be proven against him anyway. There is also no public debate on how to prevent politicians from accepting anonymous donations. Such conduct alienates the people from the state and shows that the Republic is just 'the private enterprise of a small, elitist society'." (23/07/2012)

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After the suicide bomb attack in the Black Sea resort of Burgas in which five Israeli tourists, a Bulgarian and the attacker himself were killed, Bulgaria will turn into a police state, author Kalin Terziyski fears in the daily newspaper Novinar: "From now on the state will be watching us every minute, every day, trying to check our emails and even our thoughts - all with the good excuse that it is fighting terrorism. And we will say: For heaven's sake, monitor us please, curtail our rights! Just as long as there's an end to the acts of barbarity! As long as there are no more bits of dead bodies flying around airports, and nobody's blowing us up. But let's stop to think. In what way does our Western world differ from the undemocratic and feudal-fundamentalist Orient? Isn't it precisely in the inviolability of our private sphere? In the right to anonymity and the renunciation of total control over individual personalities? Isn't freedom our most important asset in the civilised world?" (23/07/2012)

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The US rating agency Moody's has confirmed the top AAA credit rating of Germany, the Netherlands and Luxembourg for now, but lowered their outlook from "stable" to "negative". It justified the move by pointing to uncertainties about the future of the Eurozone. This means the prospect of Greece going bankrupt is more frightening than certain people are willing to admit, the liberal daily Público concludes: "Moody's assessment  is indicating precisely the opposite of what the German Minister for Economics Philipp Rösler claimed when he said that the prospect of an Athens exit from the euro had 'long since lost its sting'. The [rating agency's] warning, which is now putting pressure on even the burgeoning German economy, shows that this scenario remains a scary one - and will do for some time to come. And how is Portugal faring in these difficult times? Not well. Now that we have reached the middle of the year the implementation of the budget plans is showing cracks that the government either refuses to see or underestimates because it is confident about the correctness of its approach. But as we will see in a few months' time, the problems with the budget will cause a lot of trouble and discontent." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Ways out of the debt crisis, » Greece puts the Eurozone to the test

Former US president Bill Clinton was in Athens on Monday to meet the Greek premier Antonis Samaras. Clinton was accompanying a delegation of businessmen from the Greek diaspora that wants to pump 100 million dollars into the country. The left-liberal Ta Nea is not convinced about the initiative, saying that in the current circumstances not even expat Greeks will invest in Greece, "a country where no one can say for sure which currency it will have in two years time, and whether it will be ruled by normal politicians or some sort of extremist popular front. ... Only idiots or crooks would invest in a country like this. Not even the uncles from Chicago! And it will stay that way as long as Greece remains Europe's last communist state, with Soviet attitudes and abhorrent judicial practices, as long as ministers and bureaucrats are threatened openly with prosecution if they dare to do their jobs properly." (24/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Greece puts the Eurozone to the test

At the end of June Cyprus became the fifth country to seek formal assistance from the euro bailout fund. The country's biggest economic problems only began after it joined the Eurozone, Kostas Gouliamos, vice-chancellor of the European University Cyprus in Nicosia, argues in the Sunday edition of the liberal daily Philelefteros: "What our country is experiencing today are the consequence of its accession to the Eurozone. Shrewd analysts have said quite correctly that the Cypriot economy's liquidity requirements were transformed into credit and speculation requirements on the part of the banks when Cyprus joined the euro. Before the euro the economy was characterised by low levels of borrowing both by private households and the public sector, but just a couple of years after joining, the economy was drowning in debt. It's telling that back in 2000 private debt in Cyprus was at less than 60 percent of the gross national product (GDP), while by 2007 it had already risen to 200 percent, and in 2011 it climbed to 308.7 percent. This private debt burden belongs mainly to the banks, and now the people of Cyprus must carry the burden through the national budget." (23/07/2012)

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Who's saying what » Ways out of the debt crisis

At the start of the Swedish blueberry season the media are reporting again on the intolerable working and living conditions for foreign fruit pickers. In Uppsala one man has been arrested for human trafficking after luring Bulgarian workers to northern Sweden on false pretences. The left-liberal tabloid Aftonbladet calls for the politicians to take a stand: "As a result of numerous reports about the appalling conditions for fruit pickers the immigration authorities have toughened regulations. Employers are now forced to fulfill certain conditions. These rules, such as a guaranteed minimum wage, are not applicable to EU citizens however. They don't need a work permit and there are no official controls. This means that a berry picker from Thailand will get a minimum wage but not his Bulgarian counterpart. A borderless Europe is easily exploited by unscrupulous employers. ... It's time the government went public about how they plan to fight lawlessness, human trafficking and the exploitation of workers in our forests." (24/07/2012)

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All available articles from » Daniel Swedin

The Greek debt crisis started with the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, according to economist Victor Matheson, who examines the economic impact of major sporting events. The liberal-conservative daily Le Monde points to this analysis to support Uefa president Michel Platini's proposal not to have just one country host the European Football Championship from 2020, but to spread it across 12 or 13 cities with a suitable infrastructure."Why don't we implement the idea in 2016 [at the next European Championship in France]? Only misplaced pride would argue for organising the European Cup along strictly national lines no matter what the cost. The parliament of the Calais Nord-Pas region has wisely decided against the costly renovation of the Bollaert stadium in Lens. We can only hope that politicians in other regions are equally determined to de-nationalise the Football Championship and use public funds sensibly instead of over-stretching their budgets." (23/07/2012)

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All available articles from » Jean-Pascal Gayant