From the Guardian today (their live business feed)
Over to Greece where deadlocked talks with creditors keeping the debt-stricken country afloat have once again raised the spectre of Grexit and the need for contingency plans.
Our correspondent Helena Smith reports from Athens:
It is a scenario that in the ranks of Syriza, the governing left-wing party, no one openly wants. But as the extent of the impasse between Greece and its creditors becomes ever clear – with lenders insisting that without further cuts further bailout loans cannot be made – prominent Syriza figures have begun to talk publicly of the need to address Grexit as a possibility.
Speaking on Skai TV this morning, Nikos Xydakis, former alternate foreign minister for European affairs, said discussion of euro exit should not longer be considered “taboo.”
“There should be no taboos when we’re talking about the nation’s fate. We have come to a point where the populace has run out of stamina. I believe we need an in-depth political and national discussion that has not taken place in seven years and, of course, this discussion needs to start in parliament.”
Given that Germany’s finance minister had repeatedly raised the issue of Greece returning to the drachma it was, he added, impossible to avoid the subject. “What can you say? I’m not going to discuss it when Mr Schauble is saying it,” he asked.
Expounding on his belief that the euro zone will some day dissolve, Syriza MEP Stelios Kouloglou similarly said Athens should be working on contingency plans for a scenario that should not be discounted. “We have to be prepared for every eventuality … the government should be working on a plan,” he told the radio station, Action FM, insisting that if euro exit were to happen Greece should not do it alone but on the coattails of another euro zone member also exiting.
“Italy may leave. If that happens Greece should hide behind it and leave at the time.”
In the wake of virulent response to his comments Xydakis later tried to clarify on his FaceBook page that he was not in favour of Grexit. But his remarks appeared to have opened the door to something far bigger than he may have intended.
In a letter to EU commission president Jean-Claude Juncker, the former commissioner Anna Diamantopoulou demanded to know what plans had been drawn up around Grexit at the height of the country’s debt crisis in 2015.
“Xydakis’ statements - expected although we did not know who would utter them or when - have formally brought the views and thoughts of members of today’s Syriza-Anel coalition government to public discussion. The dilemma, drachma or euro, will sow division with civil war passion in a country which should urgently unite and stand on its feet.”