organization:syriza party

  • Greece debt crisis: Athens accepts harsh austerity as bailout deal nears | Business | The Guardian | Thursday 9 July 2015 19.39 BST
    http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jul/09/greece-debt-crisis-athens-accepts-harsh-austerity-as-bailout-deal-nears

    The Greek government capitulated on Thursday to demands from its creditors for severe austerity measures in return for a modest debt write-off, raising hopes that a rescue deal could be signed at an emergency meeting of EU leaders on Sunday.

    Athens is understood to have put forward a package of reforms and public spending cuts worth €13bn (£9.3bn) to secure a third bailout from creditors that could raise $50bn and allow it to stay inside the currency union.

    A cabinet meeting signed off the reform package after ministers agreed that the dire state of the economy and the debilitating closure of the country’s banks meant it had no option but to agree to almost all the creditors terms.

    Parliament is expected to endorse the package after a frantic few days of negotiation that followed a landmark referendum last Sunday in which Greek voters backed the radical leftist Syriza government’s call for debt relief.

    Syriza, which is in coalition with the rightwing populist Independent party, is expected to meet huge opposition from within its own ranks and from trade unions and youth groups that viewed the referendum as a vote against any austerity.(...)

    • Oui, je ne sais pas si d’autres journaux suivent d’aussi prêt.

      Helena Smith
      http://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2015/jul/09/greek-crisis-reform-plan-grexit-tsipras-draghi-live

      So what happens now? Over to Athens.....

      Our correspondent Helena Smith has confirmed that the proposed reforms have indeed been sent to the country’s creditors - and three hours AHEAD of the midnight deadline central European time.

      Government insiders are saying the proposals were sent at 1O PM Greek time (9 PM central European time) to all three creditors and the president of the Euro Group of euro area finance ministers Jeroen Dijsselbloem.

      The Dutch finance minister must sign off on the reforms before they are submitted for further discussion to EU leaders.

      The proposed package - a biting mix of tax hikes and swingeing cutbacks - was tabled in parliament as an emergency bill on Thursday. It will, say officials, be put to vote on Friday evening in order to invest the Greek prime minister, his deputy Yannis Dragasakis and finance minister Euclid Tsakalotos with the appropriate authority to negotiate on it in Brussels.

      Until a cast-iron agreement is reached, the vote will not be binding - rather is is aimed exclusively at furnishing the central protagonists in Greece’s negotiating team with the authority to debate with creditors around the proposed reforms.

      Once negotiations are completed it will become law.

      After several drama-filled days, replete with apocalyptic scenarios, a ray of hope was seen tonight. The vast majority in Tsipras’ radical left Syriza party accept that chaos lies the other way.

      But the devil will be in the detail. Panagiotis Lafazanis, who heads Syriza’s militant wing, the Left Platform, has already expressed his wholehearted opposition to the proposed plan saying it fails to give any hope of a breakthrough to the Greek economic crisis. The Left Platform represents about a third of the party.

      Zoe Konstantopoulou, the president of the parliament and a member of Syriza’s hard left herself, has publicly announced that no new memorandum outlining further austerity will be passed by the 300 seat House.

      Although, Konstantopoulou has just spent 3.5 hours with Tsipras.... and has left his office refusing to make any comment!

  • Why Greece’s Syriza party is not sticking to the script on an IMF deal | Paul Mason | Paul Mason
    http://blogs.channel4.com/paul-mason-blog/greeces-syriza-party-sticking-script-imf-deal/3717

    Privately, those within the ruling far-left party Syriza who were once confident of reaching a compromise with lenders, are now alarmed. Euro exit plans drawn up by the far left of the party are being studied seriously by those previously dismissive of them; articles contemplating a debt default have begun to appear in the party’s daily paper Avgi.

  • Greek leader faces revolt by party hardliners as debt showdown looms | World news | The Guardian
    http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/10/greece-alexis-tsipras-syriza-revolt-debt-showdown

    As prime minister Alexis Tsipras scrambles to secure a financial lifeline to keep the debt-stricken country afloat, hardliners in his radical left Syriza party have also ratcheted up the pressure. In a make-or-break week of debt repayments, the politician once seen as the harbinger of Europe’s anti-#establishment movement has found himself where no other leader would want to be: caught between exasperated creditors abroad and enraged diehards at home.

    #Grece

  • Russia Denies German Report It Is Ready to Sign Gas Deal With Greece - NYTimes.com
    http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2015/04/18/world/europe/18reuters-eurozone-greece-russia-gas.html

    Russia denied on Saturday a German media report suggesting that it could sign a gas pipeline deal with Greece as early as Tuesday which could bring up to five billion euros into Athens’ depleted state coffers.

    German magazine Der Spiegel, citing a senior figure in Greece’s ruling Syriza party, said the advance funds could “turn the page” for Athens, which is now struggling to reach a deal with its creditors to unlock new loans to avert bankruptcy.
    (…)
    Under the proposed deal, Greece would receive advance funds from Russia based on expected future profits linked to the pipeline. The Greek energy minister said last week that Athens would repay Moscow after 2019, when the pipeline is expected to start operating.

    Le Kyiv Post qui reprend l’info du NYT titre sur l’info du Spiegel et pas sur le démenti de Moscou.

    Reuters : Greece poised to sign gas deal with Russia, Der Spiegel reports
    http://www.kyivpost.com/content/world/reuters-greece-poised-to-sign-gas-deal-with-russia-der-spiegel-reports-386

  • Anti-austerity party’s Greek election win is a worry for EU, and maybe Israel
    The change of government in Greece is expected to affect its relations with Israel, which had improved beyond recognition in recent years.
    By Arye Mekel | Jan. 27, 2015 | Haaretz
    http://www.haaretz.com/news/world/.premium-1.639180

    Greece’s far-left Syriza party achieved a wider margin of victory than predicted by opinion polls leading up to Sunday’s election. The self-proclaimed radical left-wing coalition Syriza received 149 of the Greek parliament’s 300 seats (with 36.3 percent of the vote). That includes the 50-member bonus given to the winning party to guarantee governmental stability.

    Although Syriza did not achieve the 151 seats needed in order to govern alone, it wasted no time forming a government after agreeing a deal with the centre-right Independent Greeks.

    Outgoing Prime Minister Antonis Samaras’ New Democracy only managed 27.8 percent of the votes, for 76 MPs.

    The battle for third place ended in a tie between To Potami – a new centrist party headed by journalist and television personality Stavros Theodorakis – and the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party. Each has 17 MPs.

    This is a great accomplishment for both parties, for different reasons. For To Potami, it is because this was its first election. For Golden Dawn, it’s because the party chairman and several of its MPs have been in jail for almost a year, and the party campaigned. Once again, it is clear that Greece’s neo-Nazi party has taken root.

    The Communist Party came in fifth, with 15 seats, while PASOK, the socialist party that ruled for many years, reached only joint sixth place, with 13 MPs, along with the Independent Greeks.

    Syriza’s victory is expected to shake European financial markets and rattle the European Union and the International Monetary Fund, which have already pumped more than 300 billion euros into Greece, in the hope of stemming the worst financial crisis in the nation’s history.

    Syriza is demanding the repeal of the austerity programs and reforms imposed on Greece. It wants to raise the minimum wage, restore the “13th-month salary” bonus to many sectors of the economy, issue food and electricity vouchers to the poor, and introduce free medical care, among other things. It is not clear where the funding for all this would come from.

    Syriza announced before the election that it would initiate talks with the EU over abolishing the austerity and reform agreements, and would draw up a new, more lenient economic recovery program before the summer. Germany and its EU partners insist that Greece must continue to meet its commitments.

    New Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, 40, has no prior administrative experience. He is a charismatic leader who knows almost no English and usually goes without a necktie and socks in summer [he turned up at the swearing-in ceremony on Monday without a tie – he’s said he won’t wear one until Greece lands a debt reduction deal].

    The change of government is also expected to affect Greece’s relations with Israel, which have improved beyond recognition in the past few years.

    While Syriza is not a monolithic bloc, some of its members have been involved in organizing anti-Israel protests, including during last summer’s Operation Protective Edge in the Gaza Strip. At least one senior MP – Theodoris Dritsas, a possible candidate for defense minister – joined one of the anti-blockade flotillas to the Gaza Strip.

    It won’t happen right away, but Greece’s current close relationship with Israel, including on defense, could certainly be compromised.

    Tsipras has had only one significant meeting with Israeli leaders, meeting with then-President Shimon Peres in Athens. I introduced Peres to Tsipras, who had just become head of the opposition. The meeting was very good and Tsipras, who is 50 years Peres’ junior, listened to him like a pupil before his teacher, and avoided criticism of Israel. I later met other Syriza members, who said that while they were critical of Israel, they were firmly opposed to anti-Semitism.

    The author, Israel’s ambassador to Greece from 2010-2014, is a senior fellow at Bar-Ilan University’s Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies.