Does the ostentatious celebration of Russia's victory in the Great Patriotic War, which took place in Thessaloniki last week, tell us anything about the state of Russophilia in Greece?
Expenditure reduction leads to falling household incomes, contraction in public services and a rising incidence of poverty, all without progress toward the professed goal, reduction in the nominal public debt.
For many refugees, it is only the smugglers who can get them into and then out of Greece. All other legitimate and safe channels are cut off. For the smugglers, many of whom are poor, income from the refugees means that they can survive.
If the Greek government seems honest in its intentions to co-operate with the partners for a “mutually beneficial agreement”, the “working together for reform” rhetoric is hypocritical on the part of the EU institutions.
The fourth power is in dire straits, having seen a 50-place-drop in the annual World Press Freedom Index. It is now in 99th place, with only Bulgaria lower among EU members.
Smugglers are not the cause of migration; they are the consequences of the EU’s expanding border surveillance regime. The EU should concentrate on saving migrants from this regime.
This is why Syriza's negotiating strategy has to play to the European gallery and not just to the suits in the conference room. The aim is to persuade people to put pressure on their own governments or change them in the coming elections.
Europe either hangs together or - as the American revolutionaries liked to point out - the nations of Europe will be hanged separately.
Nick Dearden, director of Global Justice Now, discusses debt cancellation, EU reform and what a Syriza victory means for the anti-austerity movement in Europe.
How did the Greek press react to the recent Tsipras-Putin meeting in Moscow?
Today Alexis Tsipras will sit down in Moscow for talks with Vladimir Putin. This meeting has been dogged by controversy and has led many to wonder: what exactly do Russia and Greece hope to gain from this encounter?
What should the attitude of the European Union be towards the rise of the radical Left?
