Greek bailout
© Associated Press
Red spray paint covers a French-language Bank of Greece sign to read ‘Bank of Merkel’ in reference to German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Athens, Monday, July 6, 2015.
Illusioner er i spil i den moderne tragedie som er det græske økonomiske system, specielt når det kommer til opfattelsen af hvem der står til flest fordele af den seneste hjælpepakke.

En moderne græsk tragedie er undervejs og ligeledes er illusioner.

Den store myte er at Grækenland overforbrugte og at den græske regering var uansvarlig med dets budgetter, og i sidste ende forgældede Athen. Det er sandt at græske embedsmænd prøvede at vinde indflydelse og politisk støtte via forbrug. Det er også sandt at de underskrev lukrative kontrakter med lokale forretningsmænd.

Athens, er dog ikke en undtagelse her; den slags adfærd har politikere udvist over hele den europæiske union og hele verden.

Faktum er at det ikke var det som skabte den økonomiske krise i Grækenland. Hvad der finder sted i Grækenland og i eurozonen er noget ganske andet. Den græske redningspakke ser ud til at være en del af en ufleksibel omstrukturering af EU som placerer dets medlemmer under tysk kontrol.

Bank redningspakker versus nationale redningspakkker

Vi har ikke at gøre med nationale redningspakker for fejlende økonomier, men med redningspakker for banksektoren . Næsten alle pengene som blev givet til Grækenland, Kypern, Irland og Portugal er gået til bankerne af kreditorernes långivere.

I sin 2013 dokumentarfilm The Secret Bank Bailout, dokumenterer den tyske undersøgende journalist Harald Schumann hvordan befolkningerne i Irland, Kypern og Spanien ikke blev reddet [af redningspakken] De største modtagere af den irske redningspakke som reddede Anglo-Irish Bank var britiske, franske og tyske banker, inkluderende Union Investment Privatfonds, Rothschild et Compagnie Gestion, og Deutsche Bank. Tyske og franske banker tegnede sig for 50 ud af de 80 obligationsejere. Bloggeren Guido Fawkes opdagede at den irske regering beskyttede tyske investorer, da han offenliggjorde en liste af obligationsejerne som han havde fået fra en insider.

Den hemmelige bank redningspakke (Dokumentarfilm)


Éric Toussaint, en belgisk talsmand for komiteen for afskaffelsen af den tredje verdens gæld (CADTM) beskriver det nøjagtigt i et interview med Rosa Moussaoui, og forklarer at det lykkedes private banker at overføre deres gæld til det græske folk ved hjælp af arrangementet med hjælpepakkerne i 2012.

Tror du at Schumann og Toussaint er alene? Langt fra. Selv massemedierne og prominente analytikere indrømmer at det er præcist hvad der skete i Grækenland.

Redningspakkerne var ikke designed til det græske folks specifikationer men til behovet af de internationale finansmarkeder. med andre ord banker," som økonomen Christian Rickens åbent rapporterede i 2012 i en kommentar i Der Spiegel.

Et resumé af Rickens kommentar lyder:
"redningspakken som de europæiske finansministre er ved at enes om, vil hjælpe Grækenlands kreditorer mere end selvet landet. Lederne af EU burde kannalisere hjælpen til at genbygge økonomien istedet for at belønne økonomiske spekulatorer for deres høj-risiko handler."
Ligeledes i en analyse for Forbes, skriver Agustino Fontevecchia:
"Som det står nu, så er den græske redningspakke og den gældsaftale som de europæiske finansminstre er enedes om, en farce, det er et program som er designed til at betale Grækenlands internationale kreditorer og købe tid for på en eller anden måde at skabe vækst i et fuldstændigt ikke-konkurrencedygtigt økonomisk miljø,"
Moderne plyndring


Kommentar: Vi undskylder at resten af artiklen er på engelsk, men vores lille stab må af og til ty til blot delvis at oversætte artikler Hvis du har lyst til at hjælpe, så skriv blot til sott_da@sott.net


Greece is being pillaged. Following a neoliberal economic formula, Greek publicly owned assets are forcibly being sold to foreign investors to pay the debts of the banks. All the means for the Greek government to generate income have been liquidated to private enterprises.

"[V]aluable Greek assets of [50 billion euros] shall be transferred to an existing external and independent fund like the Institution for Growth in Luxembourg, to be privatized over time and decrease debt. Such fund would be managed by the Greek authorities under the supervision of the relevant European institutions," eurozone leaders demanded in mid-July.
greek bailout troika
© Associated Press/Thanassis StavrakisA pedestrian passes graffiti referring to the officials from the European Union, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund, together known as the troika, in Athens, Wednesday, July 29, 2015. Representatives of Greece’s creditors, its European Union partners and the International Monetary Fund, are currently meeting officials in Athens to discuss the terms of the new bailout, designed to provide 85 billion euros over three years.
On July 13, Time magazine reported that proposal geared toward "locking up Greek assets in a special fund emerged on Saturday from Germany." "The German Finance Ministry even suggested moving the titles to Greek assets to an 'external fund' in Luxembourg so that Athens could not renege on their sale," the magazine reported.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and his Syriza-led government acquiesced to the demands to privatize more public property and infrastructure. Athens handed control of its public assets to German bankers. These assets, Time reported, will include publicly owned "buildings, possible areas of land, and even islands" that are home to Greek ruins and other archeological national treasures.

The illusions go on. Not even the so-called "troika" that organized the Greek bailout is real. Though it's composed of the European Commission, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund, the troika is really a duet. While the European Commission is the executive branch of the EU, the European Central Bank is one of the six other institutions of the EU. Athens was really dealing with the EU and IMF.

Why the insistent narrative about a troika? It may be that the European Central Bank is being presented as a separate entity that is beyond the power of the public, thus preventing the public from demanding any oversight.

The Greek bailout is for Germany and Western Europe, not Greeks

Not only is it more than likely that German banks and creditors are the benefactors of Greek bailout(s), German corporations are also part of the picture. While the austerity regime that forced the Greek people's living standards to fall has reduced their wages by hundreds of millions of euros, Greek media reports started mentioning that the Greek Administrative Court of Appeals ruled that the biggest tax evader inside the country was Germany's biggest construction company, Hochtief Aktiengesellschaft.
Billede
In October, the Greek journalist Costas Efimeros reported what happened with Hochtief. The Athens International Airport that Hochtief had managed vis-à-vis Hochtief Airport Capital was ordered to pay over 500 million euros in value-added taxes or general sales taxes and dividend taxes. This was because the airport had been in a stretched out fiscal dispute over tax payments with Athens since 2001. The International Court of Arbitration in London ruled in 2013 that the international airport did not need to pay the taxes "until it makes a return on its initial investment," according to Efimeros.

This is where the story gets complicated. Although the Greek government owns the 55 percent majority stake in the Athens International Airport, the contract Athens was forced to sign stipulates that Hochtief, with its 40 percent share through Hochtief Airport Capital, selects the management and runs the airport. The German management amplified its losses in the books, and then in 2013 it sold Hochtief's shares to a Canadian insurance company. Hochtief would eventually merge with the Spanish construction and engineering giant GrupoACS, leaving what the Greek government calls a big "smudge" and cautiously transferring its Greek debt over.

The Greek government's strange Kalamatiano

Something is rotten in the Hellenic Republic. Athens has been acting schizophrenically. While Greek officials have threatened to leave the EU, they have solidified Greece's ties to Brussels. Athens has ignored the results of the national referendum on the bailout and flirted with Moscow. Despite Syriza's anti-war rhetoric and pro-Palestinian declarations, it has also moved Greece militarily closer with Israel.

Prime Minister Tsipras and his Syriza-led government held a national referendum to decide whether to accept the troika's demands on July 5. Domestic opponents argued the referendum was unconstitutional, saying that under Article 44 of the Greek Constitution referendums could only concern: (1) significant national matters and (2) important social matters, with the exception of fiscal matters. Greece's economic crisis fell under the first clause of Article 44 as an important national issue.
greek bailout tsipras
© Associated PressGreek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras reads his notes as he prepares to answer opposition questions in parliament in Athens, on Friday, July 31, 2015. The third bailout will include a new punishing round of austerity measures heaped on a country reeling from a six-year recession and more than 25 percent unemployment. Tsipras has pledged to back the new cutbacks, while openly admitting that he disagrees with them.
In the referendum, 3,558,450 out of a total of eligible 6,161,140 Greek voters voted against the referendum. The rejection of the troika's demands won with 61.31 percent of the votes.

After the referendum to reject the bailout terms was won, Tsipras and the Greek government went ahead and approved the bailout. There was internal mutiny in Syriza and many Greeks felt betrayed. It was argued that Athens only called a referendum to gain leverage in negotiations. But can a decision made by the majority of those Greeks who voted in a national plebiscite simply be ignored?

The Greek government has been involved in a strange dance where it has flirted with Russia and its BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) partners. Greece and Russia have even formed some type of agreement for extending the "TurkStream" natural gas pipeline, which is scheduled to take natural gas from Russia to Turkey via the Black Sea. The TurkStream will export Russian natural gas to the Greeks by eventually extending into Greece. Despite the courtship of Russia and the Syriza-led coalition government's threats to leave the EU and the eurozone, the Greek government's threats have proved to be mostly bluffs.


With the okay of Prime Minister Tsipras and Syriza, Greek Defense Minister Panagiotis Kammenos has even signed a deal with the Israeli military. Visiting Israel last month, Kammenos signed a status of forces agreement, which essentially means Greece will be hosting Israeli military personnel. What does this mean? The previous Greek government had allowed Israel to conduct long-range flight exercises simulating an attack on Iran. Is Tsipras allowing the Israelis to continue those preparations?

A United States of Europe?

greek bailout
© Associated PressRuined EU and Greek flags fly in tatters from a flag pole at a beach at Anavissos village, southwest of Athens, on Monday, March 16, 2015.
The Greek tragedy also has a strange twist. Where there is crisis for some, there is opportunity for others.

France has proposed that the 19 EU members in the eurozone form their own federal government complete with a single budget, one treasury department/ministry, and a unified parliament as a means of tackling the economic crisis in Greece. French President François Hollande penned an article in the Journal du Dimanche last month, calling for the formation of what is essentially a "United States of Europe" that would effectively relegate all existing governments in the eurozone into provincial or state-level governments.

Hollande's proposal signals the consolidation of what appears to be German control over Greece and the other countries of the EU.