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Varoufakis to establish a European party in February

24 December 2015 / 12:12:11  GRReporter
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Yanis Varoufakis is preparing to create his own movement. As he emphasizes, its aim will be "the European Union democratization."

Varoufakis reveals his intentions in an interview with the magazine L'Espresso.

According to the former Minister of Finance, the movement will be "unique and radical."

"I want to prove to those who accept the authoritarian policies of the European anti-democratic institutions that there is a third alternative," he states.

Once again, Varoufakis argues that the "draconian measures" imposed on Greece by the European Union were intended to prevent the Spanish people from following the Podemos movement.

The Spanish party "is leading in the right direction towards the destruction of the axis of those who declare themselves in support of the troika’s policy," says the former Minister. Simultaneously, he accuses Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi of the tension associated with Angela Merkel. "If he was, and if he is, a real opposition to Berlin, he would have prevented the exercise of inhuman pressure on Tsipras and he would not have succumbed to the demands of the troika, which now Renzi himself considers wrong but belatedly," states Varoufakis.

Meanwhile, Jeroen Dijsselbloem admitted that he had personally asked Alexis Tsipras to remove Yanis Varoufakis from the talks in the spring of 2015. The Eurogroup head said in a television broadcast on the Dutch channel NOS TV that he had insisted on the former Greek Minister of Finance not being at the head of the Greek negotiating team.

In the broadcast Nieuwsuur, which will be broadcast on Monday, Dijsselbloem, Alexander Stubb, Peter Kazimir and Yanis Varoufakis are talking about what happened behind the scenes of the key discussions between creditors and Athens.

According to a report on the website of the Dutch channel, Dijsselbloem underlined that the relationship between the Eurougroup and Varoufakis was so bad that there was no basis for discussions at all.

In a telephone conversation with Tsipras, Dijsselbloem insisted on Varoufakis resigning. The Prime Minister, according to the Dutchman, replied that not the President of the Eurogroup but the Greek government should take such a decision. Nevertheless, Varoufakis played a limited role after this phone call and changes were made in the negotiating team.

As stated by Dijsselbloem, since February he had seen no reason to negotiate directly with the former Greek Minister of Finance. "If Varoufakis does not have the powers to negotiate and conclude an agreement, then the negotiations should take place directly with the Prime Minister."

This eventually led to a meeting in Tsipras’ hotel room in Brussels, where they both found a way to restore the right course of negotiations. According to Dijsselbloem, it was a bold manoeuvre, resulting in Tsipras making a statement without Varoufakis.

In the same broadcast, Varoufakis is talking about threats, and even blackmailing. "It was clear that we could not collaborate well as there were threats and blackmailing from the outset. There was a limited framework for discussions," he is saying and repeating his view that the Prime Minister should have followed the "no" in the referendum and should not have retreated. "The threat to exclude Greece from the euro was ungrounded. It would have been illegal."

Tags: Yanis VaroufakisPartyJeroen DijsselbloemNegotiations
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