Athens Macedonian News Agency: News in English, 15-01-08

Athens News Agency: News in English Directory - Previous Article - Next Article

From: The Athens News Agency at <http://www.ana.gr/>

CONTENTS

[01] SYRIZA the alarm clock that will wake EU leaders, Tsipras says

[02] Banks' funding to continue provided Greece is in a programme, ECB says

[01] SYRIZA the alarm clock that will wake EU leaders, Tsipras says

"What we demand," he said "is a European conference, to tackle this European problem together, and there cannot be a solution without writing off a large part of the debt, a moratorium on repayments and a growth clause."

"In reality we are not asking to borrow any new money. We have no intention of asking for new lending to repay old loans. Of course we're going to negotiate with all of our partners so that we can confront together the common European problem of unsustainable Greek debt," Tsipras said.

"And this is not the first time something like a debt write-off this has been implemented," he noted. "It happened in 1953 in Germany. And I am wondering on what ethical grounds does Germany refuse a solution to the European problem, which it benefited from many years ago, when coming out of world war two, and when Germany itself had many open wounds?"

Asked on reports over Greece's exit from the Eurozone, he said: "This is a discussion that died in 2012. It's like reheated food. A dance of the zombies. The question is, are we going to religiously stick to the rules even if they are wrong and damage us, or the path that says ‘do whatever it takes to save our common home', the EU, and more importantly our society, our people."

Asked which of two he would rather have, a debt relief or the Parthenon marbles back, he said both of them and added.

"We are going to demand debt reduction, and the money Germany owes us from world war two, including reparations, but we also want the marbles, which don't belong to us but to everybody, and which need to come back to their home."

[02] Banks' funding to continue provided Greece is in a programme, ECB says

"The continuation of the waiver is based on the technical extension of the European Financial Stability Facility programme until the end of February 2015 and the existence of an International Monetary Fund programme. It is also based on the assumption of a successful conclusion of the current review and an agreement on a follow-up arrangement between the Greek authorities and the European Commission, in liaison with the ECB, and the IMF," an ECB spokesperson said in the statement.

Athens News Agency: News in English Directory - Previous Article - Next Article