[D66] A colossal failure for Europe

[J.N.]

Maria Nikolakaki
21 uur ·

Five years from its inception, the world’s biggest bailout of a
sovereign state will grind to an excruciating halt on Tuesday,
theoretically leaving Greece high and dry and on its own under a
leftwing government bitterly accusing the EU elite of deliberately using
the country as a neo-liberal laboratory.

If the experiment has been a disaster for Greece, it is also a colossal
failure for Europe, with the result that at the very apex of leadership
the EU nowadays resembles an unhappy assembly of squabbling politicians
locked in what could not be called an “ever closer union”.

Take just the last few days. On Thursday leaders at a summit
contemplated formally for the first time, however briefly, the prospect
of Britain leaving the EU. By three o’clock on Friday morning they were
all at one another’s throats in an unseemly quarrel over who should take
part in accommodating a mere 40,000 refugees from Italy and Greece over
two years, and on what terms. On Saturday, 18 governments of the
eurozone cut Greece off and initiated a process that could end in
pushing Athens out of the currency and perhaps out of the union.

Three days, three crises, and a collective performance that inspires
little hope or confidence in their crisis management."