Artwork © Dominik Herrmann

The landslide victory that Greece’s conservatives under their new leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis won in July 2019 didn’t just mark their return to power. Greece, the European country hit hardest by the financial crisis of 2008, also voted in its first post-bailout government. The price for remaining in the eurozone had been high: Since 2008, Greece lost 25 percent of its GDP and saw its unemployment rate soar by 16 percentage points. After a decade of extreme austerity measures, Mitsotakis and his Nea Dimokratia (New Democracy) party represented the promise of recovery.

Mitsotakis, a 52-year-old Harvard-educated politician came to power promising a “return to normality” that many Greeks yearned for. This was particularly true for the middle classes, which had been hit hard by the taxes imposed by the previous left-wing government to meet the country’s fiscal targets. Mitsotakis’ name was already well-known on Greece’s political scene. His family is one of three that have dominated Greek politics for decades, together with the Karamanlis family (also Nea Dimokratia) and the Papandreou family (Socialist Party).

Mitsotakis’ father Konstantinos was a prominent, but also controversial political figure during the 1960s, before the military coup. He became prime minister in the early 1990s—a toxic period in Greek politics that was marked by scandals. Konstantinos’ oldest daughter Dora Bakoyannis was mayor of Athens when the city hosted the Olympic Games in 2004; she later served as foreign minister. Kyriakos Mitsotakis, however, remained in the shadow of his family for much of his career. He was an outsider of whom nobody ever believed that he would become the leader of Nea Dimokratia or prime minister.

A Liberal Centrist

Indeed, Mitsotakis has often been underestimated by his political opponents. He was first elected to parliament in 2004; between 2013 and 2015, he then served as minister of administrative reform in the last New Democracy-led government. Mitsotakis is still remembered as the minister who dismissed 5,000 civil servants to meet the strict conditions of Greece’s second bailout program. For that, he was criticized as a tough neoliberal, making many enemies in the public sector.

In fact, Mitsotakis is more of a liberal centrist within a conservative party that has moved toward the right. The people he has selected to form his government show his effort to unite different political traditions within his party, including nationalist, liberals, and non-political technocrats. However, Mitsotakis’ government is made up mainly of men, and the few women occupy junior roles.

Initially, Mitsotakis’ agenda was focused on cutting taxes and creating jobs by bringing domestic and foreign investment to the country. His well-publicized “strategic priority” was the reduction of the primary surplus targets that were imposed by the European institutions which still keep a close eye on the country’s finances. However, his plans for an economic resurgence have been overshadowed by three serious challenges: the refugee crisis, tensions with Turkey, and the coronavirus outbreak.

Dealing with the Refugee Crisis

Mitsotakis was also elected on the promise that he would handle the ongoing refugee crisis better, but his government is still struggling with the same issues that the previous government had to grapple with. During his first months in office, the flows of migrants were at their highest since the now-defunct EU-Turkey agreement was concluded in 2016, and the new government found itself in a very difficult position.

There are nearly 100,000 asylum seekers in Greece, most of them on the islands of Lesvos, Kos, Chios, and Samos. It is clear that local communities have reached their limits as far as taking in refugees and migrants are concerned. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, pointed out on a recent visit to Greece that “hospitality and patience are less visible than before.”

Mitsotakis’ government did take steps to speed up asylum application processes. Deportations were made easier, as were transfers of refugees from the islands to mainland Greece. However, it took Mitsotakis six months to realize that it had been a huge mistake to abolish the Migration Ministry and to set it up again.

The Trouble with Turkey

Greece’s refugee crisis is made more difficult by the second challenge facing its prime minister: Dealing with his country’s historically difficult neighbor, Turkey, and in particular the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Tensions between Turkey and Greece have been exacerbated by Erdogan’s threats and actions over migrants. Mitsotakis found himself in the middle of a new border crisis as Turkey’s president carried out his threat to open the gates to Europe for migrants and refugees. Overnight, thousands of people were brought to the north-western land border between Greece and Turkey.

Mitsotakis responded by mobilizing EU support, bringing European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Council President Charles Michel, and the President of the European Parliament, David Sassoli, to the country in a highly symbolic move, stressing that not just Greece’s, but Europe’s frontiers were being threatened. He also reinforced Greece’s sea and land borders and extended a razor wire-topped fence along the Evros River.

The geopolitical crisis with Turkey, however, doesn’t stop there. Under Erdogan, Turkey has become more nationalist and more aggressive, seeking to expand its role in a new world marked by great power competition. Tensions between the two countries, which are NATO allies but also historically rivals, have also escalated over energy reserves in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Turkey was angered by gas and oil explorations planned off the coasts of Greece and Cyprus and moved ahead with its own drillings. Then Erdogan went further by signing a maritime boundaries agreement with the UN-backed Libyan government in a move to show to both Greece and Cyprus that Turkey cannot be ignored in the region.

Athens regards this as a direct challenge to its national sovereignty, as the Turkish-Libyan accord ignores the island of Crete and its Exclusive Economic Zone that is situated between Libya and Turkey. Like his predecessors, Mitsotakis is trying to strengthen strategic alliances to deal with this crisis, mainly with France, other EU member states, and the United States. But he has also made it clear that if there is no solution at a political or diplomatic level, then the dispute over maritime zones must go to the International Court of Justice in the Hague.

Fighting COVID-19

The war of words between Turkey and Greece was still ongoing, when the coronavirus outbreak took over the global agenda. The pandemic forced the Turkish president to suspend his “open gates” action.

The coronavirus outbreak in Greece could have been a disaster, as its health sector was significantly downsized and weakened during the financial crisis—today, it is nearly 40 percent smaller than in 2008. Nevertheless, Greece currently has one of the lowest number of cases and deaths in the EU.

The Greek prime minister has been praised for reacting to the crisis much faster than neighboring countries: he imposed a lockdown when there had not yet been a single death in the country. Trusting the experts and took that risk in order to protect citizens’ lives and shore up the health system as everybody knew that it wouldn’t be able to cope with a major outbreak.

Mitsotakis has also been winning the communication game by choosing two relatively unknown person to speak for the government during the crisis. Sotiris Tsiodras, a low-profile professor of infectious diseases, and Nokia Chardalias, the hard-hitting deputy minister for civic protection, have proven to be a perfect couple to address the public and explain the measures in daily briefings.

However, Mitsotakis’ next challenge is on the horizon. The latest IMF forecasts show that Greece could see a ten percent decline in GDP—the biggest in COVID-19-stricken Europe. Unemployment is likely to rise again sharply. Problems on the labor market had already started appearing before coronavirus hit, and the support the opposition is giving Mitsotakis him for the sake of public health is not going to last forever.

There is already some criticism over financial support to businesses and workers. And although ideologically Mitsotakis is a strong supporter of the private sector, he is obliged to invest more in the public health system in order to prepare the country for the months to come. Yet his popularity, which is still high, may well see him through.

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© REUTERS/Stringer

The sparkling Adriatic jewel of Dubrovnik was snarled with traffic last Friday as the leaders of 16 Eastern European countries converged on the city to hold a summit with the Chinese premier, Li Keqiang. They came hat in hand, hoping for more Chinese investment in big infrastructure projects in their countries.

Already, this city in Croatia is surrounded by examples of such investment. Just a few dozen kilometers to the South, Montenegro has taken out a €809 million loan from China to build a highway through the mountains. Neighboring Bosnia has around €2.5 billion in loans planned for Chinese-backed construction projects, and Serbia has almost €4 billion planned.

The summit’s final statement included a list of nearly 40 existing deals signed between China and the 16 European countries including in agriculture, technology, exports, e-commerce and finance.

Chinese investment in Europe is continuing to grow. Friday’s summit saw the surprise appearance of Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who promptly announced he is taking Greece into the partnership, making it the 17+1. Greece is the first new country to join the partnership since the first summit was held in Warsaw in 2012 and included 11 Eastern EU member states, five Balkan countries and China. The Chinese already own the country’s Piraeus port, from which Beijing wants to build roads to bring Chinese goods through the Western Balkans to Southern Europe and beyond.

Not in attendance was Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, though Italy could be the next country to join the group. Last month, Conte and Chinese President Xi Jinping signed a pact making Italy the first G7 country to join China’s Belt and Road Initiative, which seeks to establish a new Silk Road from the Far East to Europe.

Divide and Conquer

All of this has Western leaders in the European Union very concerned. They would prefer to see relations with China coordinated from Brussels in a way that will protect European industries from possible unfair competition. And there is concern that with formats like the 16+1, China is pursuing a “divide and conquer” strategy, locking small European countries into debt arrangements through which they can control them in what some have dubbed “debt-trap diplomacy.”

“When we negotiate with China as the EU28, we have power,” one frustrated EU official observed this week. “When they negotiate as 16, in a group that doesn’t include any of Europe’s big powers, China is dominating that format.”

This issue was supposed to be discussed at the European Council summit last month in Brussels, where Council President Donald Tusk wanted to have a broad and robust conversation about the EU’s positioning toward China. However, that summit was hijacked by the continued Brexit crisis and a robust discussion did not take place.

There were some signs at this year’s 16+1 summit that both Beijing and the Eastern EU countries are trying to allay Brussels’ concerns. After EU leaders reacted angrily to the fact that last year’s 16+1 in Sofia, Bulgaria preceded the annual EU-China summit in Brussels, this year’s 16+1 followed the Brussels summit, which took place last Tuesday ahead of the EU summit. This was meant to signal that the Brussels summit between the EU28 and China is the more important one.

Speaking in Dubrovnik, Tsipras seemed keen to avoid alarming Brussels over the idea of the partnership’s expansion. “I look forward to working with all of you in this framework of this initiative, in full respect of the rules and procedures of the European Union, to promote economic co-development through this very effective platform of cooperation with China,” he said.

The EU’s Unguarded Back Door

But concerns persist. In February, the EU voted in favor of a new law that would screen foreign investments into EU countries, thus limiting China’s ability to buy companies or infrastructure that has strategic technology, transport or military importance. While the EU could not block such bilateral deals between Beijing and member states, it will be able to screen them and render a verdict about whether they harm the national security of economic interests.

However, the law does not apply to the five countries in the Western Balkans which are not yet EU members: Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Kosovo and Albania. China has particularly focused infrastructure investment in these 16+1 countries, and some EU politicians are worried that these tiny governments, which all have significant corruption problems, represent a back door through which China can skirt EU investment oversight, as well as human rights concerns.

According to the IMF, China is already financing at least €6.2 billion worth of construction in the transport and energy sectors in the Western Balkans. These projects are not subject to the restrictions that investments in EU countries would be. For instance, China is funding new coal-fired power plants in the region, something that EU structures are now set up to discourage. The European Investment Bank, for instance, will not invest any EU money in coal projects.

China represents a hassle-free way for these governments to get financing. Money from the EU usually comes with strings attached, requiring the government to crack down on corruption and human rights abuses in exchange for getting the cash. Chinese money comes with no such restrictions. Brussels worries that for these smaller countries that are struggling economically, the Chinese money may seem like the easier route in the short term. But in the long term it will not help the countries develop and could make them indebted to China both financially and politically.

EU enlargement commissioner Johannes Hahn, who is in charge of overseeing the accession process for these countries, has cautioned them against taking the Chinese money. He has warned that these projects could jeopardize these countries’ chances of getting into the EU, saying on Twitter that irregularities in environmental impact assessments, state aid and public procurement will be “closely looked at” by the Commission.

Hahn told the AFP news agency last week that there are “concerns over the socioeconomic and financial effects some of China’s investments can have.” Saying he is particularly concerned about the amount of Chinese debt being taken on by Montenegro, he told AFP that the strings attached by Beijing to these investments has a detrimental impact on the EU’s aim to improve stability and economic development in the Balkans.

The problem with this attempt at pressure is that the Commission has publicly said there is little prospect of any new EU accession happening within the next five years, because the corruption problems in these five countries need much more work to get them up to a level where they could be in the EU. This reduces the effectiveness of any carrot-and-stick approach by the Commission, since these governments now view EU accession as a distant prospect, even though most believe it will eventually happen for all of the Western Balkans. However, by the time they join, these countries could be up to their ears in Chinese debt, with Beijing owning their infrastructure.

Reassurances

The final statement issued by the 17+1 clearly tries to allay these concerns.

It references new principles that have not been part of previous years’ statements pertaining to human rights, saying that the “three pillars of the United Nations”—peace and security, human rights and developments—are central to the partnership.

The statement also references the need for a “level playing field” for European and Chinese companies to compete on equal terms—a key Brussels demand. The summit backed away from announcing any major new projects or financing mechanisms, and the 18 countries invited the EU financial institutions to become involved in the financing of the China-backed projects.

“We respect the EU’s laws and standards,” Premier Li said while unveiling the final statement at the end of the summit. “We all need to increase trade and connect our economies.”

The assurances at this year’s summit may have put some minds at ease in Brussels. But the continued existence of a rival formation for coordinating Chinese investment in Europe—one that is very clearly dominated by China—will still raise alarm among Western EU leaders.

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© REUTERS/Yves Herman

It wasn’t until the early hours of the morning that EU leaders emerged from their emergency summit today, having decided to grant the UK a six-month extension to the Brexit deadline. They were weary-eyed and exasperated, as they have been at Brexit summits over the past two years.

But this time it wasn’t just Theresa May causing their annoyance. French President Emmanuel Macron tested their nerves last night as well.

Macron kept the summit going for hours, insisting on only a very short extension in order to keep the pressure on the British to quickly make up their minds. Earlier in the week, he had threatened to veto the extension request entirely, which would have sent the UK hurdling toward a disorderly Brexit tomorrow.

Even as he entered the summit, Macron was still holding out the possibility that he would kick the UK out of the EU before it was ready. And the language he used when speaking to reporters was strikingly familiar to those who have covered these summits for many years. Several diplomats and journalists noted that it reminded them of the most tense days of the Greek crisis.

A European Infection

Measures must be taken to prevent the chaos in the UK from spreading to the rest of the EU, Macron said. Moreover, the UK cannot be rewarded for its bad behavior. If we indulge the British with constant extensions, he argued, they will never shape up and sort themselves out. It was a sentiment that has been expressed often in Brussels over the past week.

The French president eventually backed down and agreed to a compromise of six months – not as long as the one year that Council President Donald Tusk and most other EU leaders were hoping for. But his comments reinforced a feeling that the UK is now viewed by the rest of the EU as a rotten apple – infected a virus that risks spreading to the rest of the continent.

Slovenian Prime Minister Marjan Sarec echoed Macron’s sentiments when he told reporters that the UK, “decided to commit suicide and now we are all saving him but he doesn’t want to be saved. So by drowning, he takes us all down.”

Greece too was a country on the periphery of Europe viewed as having taken bad decisions. Athens was refusing to address the problem, went the argument in 2011 and 2012, and by trying to save Greece the EU risked infecting itself. The best solution, many urged at the time, was a Grexit.

Indeed, the ‘country plus exit’ portmanteau was invented for Greece long before it was applied to the UK ahead of the 2016 referendum. It was chiefly meant for a Greek exit from the euro, although there were also voices saying the country should be kicked out of the EU entirely.

The difference, of course, was that Greeks didn’t want to leave the euro or the EU – at least not a majority of them. Then again, according to public polling this is now the case in the UK as well – with 55% of Brits now opposed to leaving the bloc.

Never-Ending Crisis

Just as the same kind of language is being used to talk about the Brexit and Greek crises, the same kind of solutions are being employed as well. In 2011 and 2012, the EU would decide to do the bare minimum to avoid impending disaster at each crisis summit, kicking the can down the road little by little. Now, as then, each new crisis summit results in the minimum required action, kicking the can further. The crisis remains, and festers.

No leader leaving last night’s summit said they felt confident that the UK can decide a way forward any time soon. The mood about whether the UK can save itself has become overwhelmingly negative.

Meanwhile, the UK can only look on impotently as the rest of the bloc decides its fate, just as Greece had to do eight years ago. And in exchange for being granted an extension, the country has been put in the dog house – subject to a review in June to determine whether it has exhibited good behavior and “sincere cooperation”. The Council conclusions spell out how the UK should behave during this period in a way which sounds like rules intended for a disobedient child. The UK should “act in a constructive and responsible manner throughout the extension in accordance with the duty of sincere cooperation,” it stipulates. The UK should restrain itself “in particular when participating in the decision-making process of the Union.”

It’s an oversight that seems eerily similar to EU’s supervision over Greece. ‘We’ll bail you out now, but we’ve lost trust in you so it will come with conditions’.

In the end, there was no Grexit. The EU’s can-kicking was able to stave off disaster, though many economists say it made the crisis much longer and more painful than it needed to be.

Will the same fate befall Brexit? Macron is only the most vocal of a camp of leaders who have had enough of the UK and think it’s best if the EU pushes them out the door as soon as possible. One wonders, in hindsight, what might have resulted from such hot-tempered solutions when it came to Greece in 2011.

The EU’s dilemma is that it cannot solve the UK’s crisis for them. It has even less tools at its disposal than it had during the Greek crisis, when at least a quick debt collectivization might have nipped the problem in the bud. Only the UK can decide to end the Brexit crisis. All the EU can do is give them room to do so. But the conditions for being granted this breathing room are becoming increasingly humiliating.

“Please do not waste this time,” Tusk warned the Brits after last night’s summit. Greeks can remember being told the same. Now Europe waits to see if the Brexit disaster can be averted as its predecessor was.

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© REUTERS/Costas Baltas

Late last week, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier visited Kalamata, the southern city of Greece best known for its olives. He was invited by Greece’s President Prokopis Pavlopoulos, a proud Kalamatan himself; they toured the nearby archeological site of Messene, one of the best-preserved ancient cities in the world, and Steinmeier received Kalamata’s golden key from the mayor.

The city’s left wing parties, however, are strongly against such niceties toward German officials, and they made their voices heard ahead of Steinmeier’s arrival. They are calling for Germany to pay Greece World War II reparations, and it’s a demand the Greek government has taken up as well, again.

On the first day of Steinmeier’s visit to Greece, both Pavlopoulos and Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras told the press—in front of Steinmeier—that Germany must pay reparations to Greece for WWII atrocities.

Tsipras said that the differences between the two countries shouldn’t be swept under the rug but resolved, according to international law.

Under the Nazi occupation of Greece, some 300,000 people perished–around 10 percent of the population at the time. Greek Jews were eradicated. The country’s infrastructure was destroyed and archeological treasures stolen. In Kalamata itself, Nazis rounded up some 520 men on February 8, 1944 and killed them, secretly burying their bodies on the outskirts of the city; families only found out about the mass grave days later. The World War was later followed by a civil war and it took decades for the country to recover.

For all these reasons, there has been a long-simmering debate in Greece on whether the country should take Germany to court.

Steinmeier, blinking in front of the press, apologized for the Nazi atrocities but didn’t comment on the reparations. An answer had already been given by Angela Merkel the previous week, when she denied that any discussions would commence.

Old Resentments and Politics

The awkward dance is nothing new for these two governments. In 2015, when Tsipras’ left-wing Syriza was first elected, a reparations committee was set up in parliament. The committee produced a report in 2016 with Greek claims totaling more than 270 billion euros, including reparations for victims’ family members, for the destruction of the country’s infrastructure, and for the 476-million-Reichsmark loan that the Nazi regime forced the Greek Central Bank to hand over.

Since he started the negotiations on the third bailout, Tsipras hadn’t brought up the reparations issue –until now, that is, and for an important reason: Greece exited the eurozone’s final bailout program in August. Yet the country is still crippled after nearly nine years of a debt crisis that saw the economy contract by more than 40 percent.

Athens might also be taking advantage of deep-seated resentment towards Berlin, a chief driver of stringent austerity measures during the crisis; many Greeks believe that policy has prolonged the crisis and sent thousands of people tumbling below the poverty line.

The Germans are fixed in their position, however. Berlin claims that after the Two-plus-Four agreement struck between East and West Germany and co-signed by France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States, no further war reparations would be made against Berlin. The Greeks, on the other hand, say they never signed such an agreement.

If Greece’s government wanted to push the matter now, however, a decision by the country’s Supreme Court would give Athens a bargaining chip. According to the decision, any German government property in Greece should be confiscated and given to the survivors of the Distomo massacre, where the SS killed more than 214 people in the village of Distomo, in retaliation for an attack by the resistance movement. If the justice minister were to sign the court’s decision, it would become binding. But no minister until now has dared to do so.

Whether the Greek government is earnestly trying to take advantage of the country’s momentum after exiting the bailouts, or if it’s just trying to cash in votes for next year’s national elections, is not yet clear. Europe, and in turn Germany, still holds immense political and economic power over Greece, even post-bailout: Athens is still paying back its massive debt, and whatever the government does has to be approved by its creditors.  If Greece stays on a hardline course to seek reparations, the situation could escalate.

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© REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis

The 28-year long row between Macedonia and Greece appears to be over. The international community can finally put the five-letter acronym FYROM (the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) aside and embrace its new moniker.

In a deal reached last Sunday, Macedonia will rename itself the Republic of North Macedonia. The Greek and Macedonian foreign ministers met at Lake Prespa which straddles their common border to sign the agreement, joined by UN mediator Matthew Nimetz and EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini.

The two countries’ young prime ministers, Alexis Tsipras and Zoran Zaev, were also on hand to celebrate the historic rapprochement. In front of the cameras, they spoke of peace, stability, and, of course, music. There were even shows of friendship—Tsipras and Zaev exchanged three kisses, as is tradition in the Balkans region, and Zaev removed his tie to hand it over as a present for the always-tieless Tsipras.

And the agreement was indeed historic. For decades now, political careers in Greece have been built on the mantra that all things Macedonian are Greek. Now, Athens will recognize its neighbor as North Macedonia. Macedonia, meanwhile, will be able to call its language and its citizens Macedonian, but it will cease to make claims on Hellenic history or the ancient Greek King of Macedonia Alexander the Great. In return, Athens has agreed to stop vetoing Macedonia’s EU and NATO membership. In the Balkans—Europe’s traditional powder keg—that’s a lot of compromising.

At home in their respective countries, however, the deal sparked outrage among nationalists; they protested outside both parliaments, chanting: “Down with the traitors. You’re selling our country. Macedonia is ours.” And both governments know the issue is not well and truly resolved. First, they’ll have to convince the people of their countries that the deal is mutually beneficial. Then they have to submit the agreement to their parliaments for ratification.

The FYROM needs to change its name by the end of 2018 and expunge any territorial claims on the northern Greek province of Macedonia from its constitution. After that, it will need to notify all countries as well as international organizations and institutions that its name has been changed to the Republic of North Macedonia.

Within a month from the signing, a joint committee of experts on historic, archaeological, and educational matters must also decide whether school textbooks, maps, historical atlases, and teaching guides in both countries need revising. Another committee will meet to agree on trademarks and commercial names.

Seeking EU Membership

Macedonia will seek admission to NATO and the EU as soon as the agreement comes into effect, and Tsipras will notify the President of the European Council that he supports the opening of accession negotiations. The Greek prime minister hopes his support will boost his negotiating power during upcoming talks on Greece exiting the EU’s bailout program.

After all this, the ball is firmly in the EU’s court. Enlargement has virtual been on hold for more than a decade now, with Croatia being the last country to join in 2013. Even though the latest Commission Staff Working Document on Macedonia’s accession process, published in April, says that Zaev’s government is advancing the EU reform agenda, the absence of a concrete accession date has emboldened nationalists and euroskeptics in the country.

Ethnic passions still run high. Just last year, Zaev, who was then the leader of the opposition, was beaten up by protestors for electing an ethnic Albanian as parliament speaker. In 2001, ethnic violence broke out between the Albanian minority and security forces, spilling into an armed conflict and leading to the death of a thousand people. The violence only ended after the United Nations became involved.

For the EU, moving forward with accession might be the only way to stop Russia’s and Turkey’s expanding influence in the Balkans. But that would then be more of a political decision rather than a genuine consideration of whether the countries in question meet the EU accession criteria.

Perpetual talks with little progress have led to disengagement in the Balkans. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see some parts of former Yugoslavia falling into another world power’s lap. Both Moscow and Ankara—not to mention Beijing—have gained significant footholds in the region while, in the meantime, Brussels has been dragging its feet.

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© REUTERS/Francois Lenoir

On Saturday night, as viewers around the world tune in for the grand final of the Eurovision Song Contest, the most interesting thing may be who isn’t there.

After a national scandal involving a famous Greek pop singer pretending to be Mexican, Greece has failed to qualify for the final. After fielding an entry likely intended as a political ploy in a dispute with Ukraine, Russia has been eliminated from the contest. And after refusing to air the Irish and Albanian entries during this week’s semi-final, China has been banned from airing the contest.

Every year dozens of European countries field a song for the competition, with the winner hosting the following year’s contest; Eurovision has been in equal measure delighting and irritating audiences for six decades. But over the past 18 years it has exploded in popularity, with viewers across the world making it the most-watched live television event in the world, surpassed only by the World Cup. Some 200 million people are expected to tune in this year.

Since the countries formerly behind the iron curtain joined the contest in the late 1990s, it has been split into three separate shows to accommodate the 43 contestants (and avoid a six-hour long program). Countries are eliminated during two rounds of semi-finals the week before the contest. The “big five”—France, Germany, Spain, Italy, and the UK—do not have to face elimination in the semi-finals because they pay the most for the contest.

Eurovision has always been fairly political, but this week’s semi-finals developments shocked many viewers and participants.

Cyprus’ Secret Albanian Greek Pop Star

Going into Saturday’s final, Cyprus’ entry Fuego, sung by Eleni Fourera, has emerged as the favorite to win. The catchy pop tune and Beyoncé-style hair flipping in Tuesday’s semi-final thrust it ahead of Israel’s entry Toy, which has been plagued by staging problems.

Fourera is not Cypriot. In fact, she has no real connection to Cyprus. The country doesn’t have much in the way of a domestic pop music industry and imports music from Greece instead. As a consequence, Cyprus’ Eurovision entries are often Greek.

Fourera is one of Greece’s hottest pop stars of the moment, but she is not ethnically Greek. She was born in neighboring Albania as Entela Fureraj, and her parents moved to Greece when she was seven. But because of hostility toward Albanians in Greece, she claimed to be Mexican and changed her name to Fourera when she joined the Greek girl group Mystique in 2007.

In 2013 a Greek newspaper outed her as a secret Albanian, and eventually she acknowledged her heritage. With nationalist sentiments flaring in Greece, she did indeed face the backlash she feared. And this year, when she decided she wanted to participate in Eurovision, she was rebuffed. The Greek broadcaster wanted a Greek singer singing in Greek (a sharp departure from their previous entries, which have almost always been in English). So Eleni approached the Cypriot broadcaster to represent their entry, and Fuego was born.

There are in fact three ethnic Albanians competing in the final: Eleni, Albania’s Eugent Bushpepa, and Italy’s Ermal Meta (born in Albania but raised in Italy). During rehearsals last week, they took a photo together making the ‘Albanian eagle’ hand gesture. That caused outrage in Greece, where the gesture is widely interpreted as a nod to Greater Albania, a nationalist concept that involves annexing parts of Greece. Prominent Greeks called for Eleni to be rescinded as a contestant, apparently forgetting that Cyprus is in fact a separate country. The Cypriot broadcaster was forced to publicly announce that they still support Eleni as their entry.

Then came the result that stunned Greece: Their song, Oneiro Mou, did not receive enough votes in Tuesday’s semi-final to qualify for the show—unheard of for the Eurovision-obsessed country. After taking some days to absorb the shock, Greek fans in Lisbon are now fully embracing Eleni as their own.

Goodbye, Russia

The other semi-finals shock was Russia’s failure to qualify – something that has never happened before in the history of Eurovision.

Russia put forward Julia Samoylova, a wheelchair-bound singer with spinal muscular atrophy who represented the country last year. The move was widely interpreted as an intentional trap set for Ukraine, to force Kiev to kick Russia out of the contest. Russia had originally intended to refuse participating in protest of Ukraine’s winning song in 2016, a thinly-veiled critique of Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Samoylova could not enter Ukraine because she had performed a concert in Crimea, entering via Russia.

Samoylova’s song this year, I Won’t Break, was seen by many as painting a picture of globalist forces conspiring to hurt Russia. But it was a poor performance with weak vocals, and it was eliminated in the semi-final on Thursday night. There is already speculation that Russia will use the failure to qualify as a pretext to permanently pull out of the contest, just as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan did in 2012 after Turkey failed to qualify. For the moment, the Russians are claiming that Samoylova’s earpiece wasn’t working and that’s why she sang poorly.

With Russia having emerged as a pantomime vision for Eurovision fans, partly because of Eastern European political tensions and partly because of Russia’s anti-gay policies, the news of the country’s failure to qualify was greeted enthusiastically in the arena. But it will further feed Russia’s narrative of international persecution at home.

China Banned

The European Broadcasting Union, which organizes the yearly contest, has become obsessed with increasing the already enormous audience figures, engaging in a quest to spread viewership to new regions. As part of that strategy, it inked a deal with China’s broadcaster a few years ago.

But Eurovision has a strict rule that if you broadcast the contest, you must air every entry. The genesis of this rule comes from Israel’s participation in the competition. Arab countries such as Morocco have participated or expressed interest in participating in the past, but only if they can black out the Israeli entry during the broadcast. And so, they cannot participate.

In 2008, Azerbaijan blacked out the entry of its neighbor Armenia as the two countries are still at war. As a consequence, it was banned from participating in or airing the contest for one year.

On Tuesday night during China’s broadcast of the first semi-final, the screen went black during the Irish and Albanian entries. The former because it featured a gay couple, and the latter because the singer has tattoos.

Questions swirled over how the EBU would respond. China’s audience is huge, and there was speculation that Eurovision’s quest for ever larger ratings would make them bend the rules for China. But on Thursday night, shortly before Russia failed to qualify, the EBU announced it was banning China from airing the contest because of the omission. There has been no comment yet from Beijing.

As fans across the world brace for the final, it’s worth noting that this year’s contest is especially fraught with geopolitical tensions. No matter who wins, the result is guaranteed to be contentious.

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© REUTERS/Sergio Perez

The man who outraged the EU in 2015 while trying to negotiate Greece’s debt restructuring officially announced the formation of a new party on March 26. Called, in English translation, the Realistic Disobedience Front, or MERA25, it is a coming-together of leftists, greens, and liberals.

The date of the party’ announcement was no coincidence, coming just one day after Greece’s national independence day. Varoufakis is indeed asking for independence, but this time from the country’s lenders.

It’s been almost three years since Varoufakis last tried to wrest back power from the country’s creditors. During the tumultuous six months he spent in talks with Christine Lagarde of the IMF and then-German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, he refused to sign another loan, instead asking for a debt restructuring. The end of the negotiations and his resignation came after Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras decided to go ahead and accept a third bailout in July 2015.

But Varoufakis didn’t stay on the sidelines for long. He turned his experience into a best-selling book, Adults in the Room; in February 2016, along with Croatian writer and activist Srecko Horvat, Varoufakis launched DiEM25, a pan-European political movement with the goal of reforming the EU and its institutions.

Back To Greece

Over the last few months, however, Varoufakis has shifted his attention back to Greece and started campaigning across the country. For now, it’s a one-man-show: Varoufakis talks, Varoufakis presents the party’s positions, and Varoufakis answers questions.

I watched one of his campaign stops last month in Kalamata in southern Greece. It’s a traditionally right-wing city, but the small theater was full; some came because they were curious to hear what the economist-turned-celebrity had to say, while others were actively searching for a new party to support.

In his usual laid-back style, the eloquent economist called for “constructive disobedience” toward the country’s lenders: Because Greeks can’t stick to the “irrational austerity policies” that have “destroyed” the country, they have to disobey; but because merely disobeying isn’t enough, the government has to offer “realistic and responsible proposals” as well.

These are some of the proposals that make up what Varoufakis calls “urgent policy:” putting an end to home foreclosures until the real estate market picks up and the country is out of the crisis; reducing taxes, specifically VAT and those for small and medium-sized businesses, from 22 percent to 15 to 18 percent; instead of the current, “unrealistic” goal of 3.5 percent primary surplus, aiming for a 1 to 1.5 percent surplus

Other ideas include a public non-bank payments system to allow free transactions between the public and the state. If the banks are closed like in 2015, the state could borrow directly from the public, circumventing the financial markets while offering a much larger interest rate than the banks. Varoufakis also wants to restructure Greece’s public debt, protect wage labor (thousands of Greeks are employed as contractors without job security, and therefore have to pay their own health insurance), and end all fire sales of Greek public property; instead, he proposes to create a development bank that will use public assets as collateral in order to create investment flows into both public assets and the private sector.

Stay or Go?

At the campaign rally, one of the first questions to come from the public was a familiar one: to Grexit or not to Grexit? Varoufakis said he’s in favor of Greece staying in the EU, although Greece should never have entered it. But like in so many other cases, Varoufakis left us trying to parse his words.

“Grexit isn’t the worst thing that could happen, but it’s also not the best development for Greece,” he said, pointing out that the government’s agreement to a surplus of 3.5 percent until 2060 will have an even more devastating result than a Grexit would because it will mean another 40 years of austerity.

On the other hand, he said, a Grexit would deal a severe blow to thousands of Greeks in the short-term, but then the economy would bounce back in a few years. So it would appear he would support a Grexit. But then he added: “But I can’t take that responsibility,” leaving the crowd puzzled.

It won’t be a surprise if Varoufakis’ MERA25 gains Parliament seats in next year’s European elections. The current government has failed to improve conditions, and the promise that the country will leave the bailout program by August 2018 and start borrowing from the international market isn’t really appealing to people suffering from the ongoing crisis. Unemployment is still at 20 percent, and the quarter of the country’s GDP lost since Greece’s troubles began hasn’t been recovered.

What’s more, Varoufakis might be a menace and a champagne-socialist to his opponents, but for his voters he’s still the only Greek politician who refused to sign new austerity measures. Plus, he’s famous—and able to fill a political void that currently exists in Greek politics. Other than the communist party, there’s no other anti-austerity party in parliament. For Greeks the choice next year may look like this: endless austerity—or Varoufakis.

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© REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis

For a cash-strapped country like Greece, an additional €66 million in the state coffers should be welcome news. The country’s economy has made only faltering progress, still reeling from the 2008 eurozone debt crisis. Unemployment remains above 20 percent – youth unemployment about 50 percent – and the economy has contracted by a quarter since the crisis began. Pensions have been slashed and Greeks are bracing for more austerity, with new, highly unpopular cost-cutting measures set to continue through 2020 at least.

So Greece’s €66 million deal to sell missiles and munitions to Saudi Arabia was considered a much-needed boost for Athens. However, it has sparked a heated political debate and created yet another headache for Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’ government.

Defense Minister Panos Kammenos, who inked the deal, is under pressure to resign after revelations that he had allegedly used an illegal intermediary to negotiate the terms of a deal between two governments, breaking Greece’s anti-corruption laws. The Saudi-Greek pact collapsed last week in parliament after the Committee on Military Equipment revoked its original vote allowing the pact to go through. The opposition said it had lost its trust in the defense minister, and would vote against any other arms deal brought to the committee.

Kammenos, who is the leader of the right-wing Independent Greeks party, Tsipras’ junior coalition partner, continues to deny the accusations. He says the middle man in question is an official advisor to the Saudi government. But an anti-corruption prosecutor has opened an investigation into the possible wrongdoing.

Alexis Tsipras was only able to build his frail majority – 153 of 300 seats – with the help of the Independent Greeks, who have nine MPs in parliament. So the left-wing prime minister has been left with little choice but to back Kammenos.

A History of Bribes

Greece is no stranger to multibillion-euro arms deals. It is, after all, one of only five NATO members already spending 2 percent of its GDP on defense. But some of Greece’s biggest bribery scandals have been linked to weapons contracts. Just last month, one of the country’s leading defense ministers in the 1990s was sent to jail for 20 years for receiving bribes tied to big arms deals with Russia and Germany.

Even so, the latest agreement has proven especially controversial. Opposition politicians and critics question the legality and ethics behind selling 300,000 105-millimeter shells to Riyadh as the government their continues its bombing campaign against Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen, trapping more and more civilians in the ceasefire.

According to a United Nations report, the Yemen war has sparked the worst humanitarian crisis since 1945. The organization’s humanitarian affairs office reports more than 10,000 people have died, half of them civilians.

Greece’s attempt to sell arms to Riyadh came despite the European Parliament’s vote to impose a European embargo against Saudi Arabia. The overwhelming majority of the parliament voted to institute an EU-wide ban on selling arms to the Saudis due to “serious allegations of breaches of international humanitarian law by Saudi Arabia in Yemen.” EU member states are not compelled to adhere to the parliament’s vote, but the pressure on Brussels to pass a binding decree is mounting.

Despite strong condemnation of the humanitarian situation in Yemen, Greece is certainly not the only one trying to score big in weapons deals with Riyadh. Since the war began three years ago, British companies have sold 5.2 billion euros in arms to the Saudis, waved through by the UK government. Germany, one of the world’s largest arms exporters, has also come under fire for selling tanks and heavy military machinery to Saudi Arabia, and for sealing a deal earlier this year with the United Arab Emirates, part of the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen.

An Uncomfortable Situation

In Greece, even if the anti-corruption prosecutor finds no evidence of a misdeed, Alexis Tsipras is facing an uncomfortable situation: after participating in dozens of anti-war rallies in the past, he may well have to abandon the moral high ground to the opposition.

It is not the first time Kammenos has put Tsipras in a difficult position. In a bid to cling to power, the prime minister has been forced to back his government ally through several scandals. Last summer, telephone conversations between Kammenos and a convicted drug dealer were leaked. Kammenos did not deny talking to the convict. The opposition accused Kammenos of meddling in the affairs of the justice system, but the minister said he was trying to convince the man to cooperate with the prosecutors.

Still, Tsipras has stood behind his defense minister. But as support for the government continues to slide and the opposition climbs in the polls, the prime minister’s handling of this latest flare-up could be an important factor in deciding his future.

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© REUTERS/Giorgos Moutafis

Burns cover the face and body of nine-year-old Amina. They’re from when a bomb fell on her house in Aleppo, Syria. Leila, 10, still has nightmares of Islamic State fighters entering her Yazidi village in Sinjar in Northern Iraq. Busra, 16, has tried to commit suicide twice already. She can’t stand living in a camp on this Greek island anymore. She misses her brother back in Syria.

The three girls don’t know each other, but they have something in common – they live in fear of being deported. And they are living in limbo.

Along with their families, the girls are among the more than 21,000 people that arrived to Lesbos after March 2015, when the European Union and Ankara sealed a deal to send migrants back to Turkey, preventing them from traveling onward to the mainland or Western Europe.

According to the conditions of the EU-Turkey deal, the European Union will have to give Turkey another 3 billion euros on top of the 3 billion originally agreed – money to be spent on improving refugees’ living conditions in the country. The pact also involved a complex exchange agreement: For every Syrian refugee sent back to Turkey from the Greek islands, another Syrian refugee will be resettled directly from Turkey to an EU country. In return, the EU would liberalize visa requirements for Turkish nationals.

Nine months later, both sides have struggled to stick to the deal.

The influx of migrants has indeed slowed considerably compared to 2015. Last month, 2,000 migrants arrived on all of the Greek islands, around a third less than the previous two months. In November 2015, around 100,000 people from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, North Africa and elsewhere arrived.

But thousands keep arriving in Greece. Most didn’t have a choice, as half of their families were already in Europe. And others were so destitute that they took the chance anyway. In the camps, many – like Amina, the nine-year-old burn victim – need serious medical attention. According to the UNHCR’s latest data, only a small fraction of the refugees living in Turkey has actually been relocated to Europe – just 4,000 so far.

Is Turkey “Safe”?

It’s difficult to consider Turkey a “safe country,” either. Its asylum-system is barely three years old, and its infrastructure cannot serve three million refugees. Turkey still denies full refugee status to non-Europeans. And the failed coup six months ago has led to a sweeping crackdown and a purge, with thousands arrested, fired and persecuted. The EU Parliament recently voted to freeze Turkey’s EU accession talks “due to concerns about the human rights violations.” The vote was non-binding, but it sent a clear signal to Ankara.

It’s another sign that discourse between the EU and Turkey has turned sour. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan continues to threaten to tear up the deal and send three million migrants streaming toward the Greek islands if the EU doesn’t pay the rest of the 6 billion euros it promised, and if visa-free travel isn’t granted soon.

But even with the six billion euros, refugees’ living conditions in Turkey are still difficult. Those who make it out of camps face discrimination, high rents, and low-paid jobs. For them, Europe still seems like the only viable choice on the horizon.

Meanwhile, the number of asylum-seekers in the region keeps increasing. Turkey is already hosting more than three million refugees. With the help of Russia, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces have been destroying the rebel stronghold of East Aleppo. In Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Taliban’s power has been growing. Libya is in chaos. Egypt’s economy is teetering on the brink of collapse, too, raising the possibility of the Arab world’s most populous state becoming a new source of refugees.

Stricter controls in the Balkans have shut down the main route for migrants. But the number of those now trying to reach Europe via the Mediterranean and Italy, a much deadlier route, has been rising. Conditions in various African countries are deteriorating quickly, spurring a new wave of migrants.

So far, only 754 asylum-seekers have been deported to Turkey. Human rights organizations like Amnesty International and UNHCR interviewed deportees after they arrived to Turkey and found that many weren’t even allowed by the Greek authorities to apply for asylum. The media recently highlighted the cases of two men, a homosexual Syrian and a Christian Syrian likely to face persecution in the Middle East, who were scheduled for deportation to Turkey.

More EU Help Needed

Greece is struggling under the weight of a massive backlog of asylum cases, and also under EU pressure to increase deportations. Asylum cases are taking far too long to process. Greek immigration agencies are understaffed and overworked: Only 700 people are working on asylum applications that require days of interviews, investigations and paperwork. The cash-strapped Greek government can’t hire more asylum application processors, either, due to the conditions on the international loans that are keeping the country afloat.

The backlog has now reached around 60,000 applications, not including the appeals of asylums seekers whose applications are rejected. The Greek Ministry of Immigration has asked for EU help, and Brussels promised 400 staffers. But only 36 have arrived so far. The Belgian staff left two weeks ago, fearing for their safety after shots were fired in one of the refugee camps.

Amid the turmoil, refugees are growing increasingly restive. Around 40,000 are living in tents as the rainy days and cold nights of the Greek winter approach. Last week on Lesbos, an Iraqi woman and a child from Iraq died after their gas canister used for cooking and heat exploded.

People on Lesbos often cite a Greek proverb when they hear their leaders claiming the EU’s deal with Turkey is solving the worst refugee crisis since the Second World War: it’s like hiding the dust under the carpet.

The post Near Breaking Point appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

© REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis

When Alexis Tsipras burst into the spotlight in early 2015, he was seen by most in Europe as too young, too radical, and too left. At just 40, he was fresh-faced and irreverent, and already head of Greece’s Syriza party – a motley crew of radical left-wing groups, from ecologists to Trotskyists.

Across Europe, the prospect of a Tsipras win raised the specter of chaos in Athens and a Grexit, with a domino effect in Spain, Portugal, and Italy looming on the horizon. An earlier article in Germany’s Der Spiegel had included Tsipras in a list of the twenty most dangerous politicians for Europe’s unity, along with France’s far-right Marine Le Pen and Italy’s flamboyant Silvio Berlusconi.

But most Greek voters didn’t agree. They saw Tsipras as the only hope to bring Greece out of its deep misery. He vowed to end austerity, stop further budget cuts, and lift the economy back on its feet. So they gave Tsipras the mandate he needed and Syriza swept to power in January 2015.

Nearly two years later, Tsipras hasn’t delivered on those promises. Instead, he and his government (including his coalition partners, the far-right Independent Greeks, or ANEL) are considered German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s darlings. It’s certainly been an abrupt about-face from the prime minister’s “Go back, Mrs. Merkel” speech on the campaign path to his cozy ties with Berlin today.

A Disappointing Record

Once in office, Tsipras compromised with Greece’s lenders and expanded upon the previous governments’ austerity policies. He privatized public assets, slashed pensions for the sixteenth time, and lifted a state-imposed ban on foreclosing family homes.

But those measures haven’t seemed to have much impact on the ailing economy. Unemployment is gradually falling, but almost a quarter of the population is still out of work. Highly-skilled young Greeks are migrating to Western Europe to find jobs, while businesses are either shutting down or fleeing to nearby Balkan countries with more attractive tax rates. State debt is at a record 179 percent of Greece’s GDP.

Tsipras never managed to win consensus for his austerity plans either. Greeks haven’t taken to the streets en masse, but disillusionment with the government is growing and Tsipras’ popularity plummeting.

According to an October poll by the Athens-based survey group Greek Public Issue, only 14 percent of Greeks would vote for the current union government. Less than a quarter of voters see Tsipras as the best possible prime minister among the country’s leading lawmakers.

Tsipras was dealt yet another blow in late October when Greece’s highest court struck down a new television licensing law. The government had championed the legislation as a way to crack down on Greek oligarchs owning television stations and broadcasting without licenses for nearly thirty years. Syriza claimed these media moguls were influencing elections. But critics argued the law was merely Syriza’s attempt to create its own group of media moguls.

And the prime minister’s cabinet reshuffle in early November has come under heavy criticism as well – his newly appointed ministers will only have three weeks to negotiate with the country’s lenders on important issues like privatizations, a new minimum wage, and collective redundancies.

Now, pressure is mounting and the prospect of early elections or a reshuffling of the government is looking ever more likely. Tsipras, however, continues to bat down the possibility. “We’ll have elections in autumn 2019. The people will judge [us] then, freely and unaffected,” he told a group of European reporters last month.

Voters seem to have a different opinion. An overwhelming majority – 85 percent in Public Issue’s latest poll – doesn’t agree with the government’s economic policies and 45 percent believe that neither of the two largest parties can lead the country out of crisis.

An Uphill Battle

From any angle, Tsipras is facing an uphill battle and it’s unclear if he’ll be able to turn around his fortunes. What’s more, a new round of taxes will go into effect in 2017. Everything from landlines and cellphones to heating oil will carry an additional tax. The effect on industry has already been startling. Tens of thousands of small and medium-sized businesses either shut down or moved to Bulgaria, where the corporate tax rate is a stable ten percent. That is a far cry from the sixty percent in taxes and social security contributions they face in Greece.

The country’s international lenders haven’t lightened the load, refusing to even discuss a debt write-off. The IMF has now acknowledged it made mistakes in its handling of the eurozone crisis, particularly in pushing Greece to follow certain austerity policies. According to an IMF report published last summer, the fund says it should have recognized the Greek economy’s deep dysfunction and pushed for debt restructuring far earlier.

In fact, Greece had been building an inflated economy on shaky foundations over four decades. The two ruling parties, PASOK and New Democracy, allowed a system of patronage to flourish in public and private sectors. Politicians promised jobs to their constituents in exchange for votes. Bribes were the norm for doing business with the government, and they often came from abroad. German companies were also involved.

Meanwhile, Athens kept borrowing to fund its growth while globalization was crippling the country’s manufacturing sector. When the housing bubble burst in the United States in 2008, it was as if a tsunami swept over Greece, drowning the country in its own debt. The sociopolitical landscape in Greece changed swiftly. Systematic cronyism fell apart: As part of the EU-IMF bailout agreement, hiring in the public sector was frozen.

A Blessing in Disguise?

With hindsight, Syriza might have been a blessing in disguise to Greece’s pro-austerity camp. The party can be credited with implementing tough austerity measures that previous governments couldn’t manage – the very same measures that spurred hundreds of thousands of people to take to the streets in 2010 and continue protesting all the way through 2015.
During those demonstrations, Syriza ended up absorbing most of Greece’s union leaders, grassroots movements, and historic left-wing figures. Along came dozens of former PASOK members who were scrambling to save their political future.

As prime minister, Tsipras has managed to tame his party and close ranks. He swept out Syriza’s far-left elements and kept only those that were true to him and his close circle of influence. Those who were forced out now hold Tsipras responsible for ruining the Greek left’s only real chance to steer the country’s politics. Historically, Greece’s left has only had limited political influence, if any.
Meanwhile, Tsipras and the party have undergone significant change, as was evident at the Syriza party convention last October. Athens was covered in banners proudly featuring Tsipras’ face. Some 2800 loyal party members showed up at the convention and clapped throughout the prime minister’s speech, backing all his policies with almost religious fervor.

Praying for an Obama Miracle

With Greek debt ballooning, Tsipras is desperately looking for EU partners to ensure his political survival. But he still hasn’t managed to build a coalition with Italy, Spain, and Portugal to oppose German-driven austerity in Europe.

So the government is now banking on US President Barack Obama’s visit in mid-November to help convince Greece’s lenders to write off some of the country’s colossal debt. Greek media are buzzing with hopes of a miracle from Obama – he has been the only Western leader speaking out against austerity. The US president will push the IMF and EU leaders to ease Greece’s debt load, they daydream. That would certainly help the prime minister pick up some points with his electorate.

Still, it might be too little too late for Tsipras. In a press conference back in 2015, he declared he would only start putting on a tie if he managed to come to an agreement with the country’s creditors and secure a debt write-off. He has stuck to the promise and never worn a tie.

But even if he does succeed in relieving Greece’s debt burden, he should be careful not to get too comfortable in his new clothes. Because the tie may come to symbolize just how much he has compromised – and that could spell political doom.

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