Category Archives: Greece

Ratings agency downgrades Greece to lowest credit rating

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The Moody's logo

Economy

The ratings agency Moody’s has downgraded Greece to the lowest rating on its bond scale. The agency lowered Greece’s rating to C from Ca, warning that the risk of default remained high after a recent EU debt deal.

Greece was further downgraded by Moody’s ratings agency late on Friday to the lowest rating on its bond scale.

The agency said it had lowered Greece’s sovereign rating from Ca to C in the wake of a recent EU deal to write off 107 billion euros ($141.3 billion) of Greek sovereign debt which will see private investors incur major losses.

Greece starts building fence on Turkish border

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Wonder if there will be massive protests every week at North American universities over this ‘apartheid wall’

From Euro-observer

Greece starts building fence on Turkish border

06.02.12 @ 16:21

By EUOBSERVER

Greece on Monday started building a 10-km long fence on its border with Turkey to keep out thousands of irregular migrants seeking to cross into Europe. “This is a project which has practical and symbolic value,” citizen protection minister Christos Papoutsis told reporters. Its cost is estimated at €5.5 million.

“In the past two weeks we’ve witnessed a coup d’état”

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Peter Hitchens chillingly reflects in the London Daily Mail today (How long before the grey dictators march on London?) on how the European Union is entering a frighteningly authoritarian endgame:

Civilian juntas have seized power in Rome and Athens. Soon, similar gangs of grey men may be sweeping aside national governments in Madrid and Lisbon. Nobody much [in the media] is protesting. In time – don’t rule it out – it could be our turn here [in Britain]…

Our ruling Left-wing elite seem oddly untroubled by the ruthless snuffing-out of national sovereignty across southern Europe. If the same thing had been done by a bunch of colonels, they would have been piously outraged…

But of course these putsches are the work of the European Union, a project the Left have long supported. And the EU is more subtle than any colonels. There is no need for midnight arrests or tanks on the streets. The enormous invisible power of the EU’s law and institutions gets its way without any need for such things.

He continues.

The sheer dictatorial nerve of Italy’s new viceroy, Mario Monti, is impressive. He has formed a government without a single elected politician in it…

Once again, please pay close attention. This is the best warning you will ever get of what the EU is really about. It is an empire, in which the great nations of Europe, including ours, are intended to disappear for ever.

What’s taking place in Europe should stagger and frighten us all, but it doesn’t seem to affect the populous, and it’s true horror is not even momentarily permeating the mainstream media. Maybe because it’s all happening so smoothly, so effortlessly? It’s almost as if the European system had been gently and deliberately designed for decades, with the aim of facilitating precisely such a total removal of democracy, and its substitution with a Euro-statist technocracy.

The British Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan, also this week, very adroitly summarized events in the following speech to the European Parliament.

Merkel wants ‘permanent’ supervision of Greece, warns of war

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From EUObserver

Oct 26 2011 @ 15:31

Brussels – Peace should not be taken for granted if the euro fails, German chancellor Merkel told MPs Wednesday (26 October) ahead of the eurozone summit where an increase of the bail-out fund firepower may lead to Germany’s own state assets being taken as collateral.

In a dark blue jacket reflecting the mood in and about the eurozone, Merkel abandoned her usual cautious rhetoric warned outright of a war. Continue Reading →

Building To Be Reconstructed Into Mosque For Muslim Community In Athens

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I think perhaps it is time that the teaching of Greek history be taught in Greek schools once again. This story has me a little, to quote a friend of mine, ‘gobsmacked’.

Under the article, I will post the graphic needed to take to your local T shirt stall in a mall near you, and have a T shirt made that reflects Greek and Islamic history a bit more rationally than the current story below.

H/T Snaphanen.DK

 

From Greek Reporter.com

Posted on 23 July 2011 by

 

Current building in Botanikos to be reconstructed into Mosque.

The Greek government will finance the reconstruction of building structures into mosques for the Muslim community in Athens. Estimated to cost less than 15 million, the existing plans for the mosque will serve 500 faithful Muslims.

The building of the former Naval Base in Botanikos has been chosen and once it is renovated and converted, it will operate as an Islamic mosque in Athens. According to the amendment tabled in parliament it will be incorporated in a bill being debated by the Ministry of Environment Energy and Climate Change which governs energy issues.

The Steering Committee of the mosque consists of five Greek government officials and two Muslims from recognized associations in Athens. The Islamic leadership position, often the worship leader of a mosque and the Muslim community will be appointed after approval by the Minister of Education. Continue Reading →

Cyprus: The long decline of international law

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• Cyprus: The long decline of international law

EuropeNews July 20 2011
By Henrik R. Clausen

Today, July 20th 2011, marks the 37th anniversary of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. While invading countries is generally held to be illegal (and rightly so), Turkey has gotten away with the invasion and the ensuing occupation with remarkable few consequences. This is in great extent due to the non-application of international law and fundamental principles in the matter. Conversely, a just and lasting solution to the Cyprus problem can be found in classical international law, common sense that is actually not too hard to understand.

Prehistory

Cyprus has a traceable archaeological history dating back more than 10,000 years, and while having been under a variety of rules over the last millennia, was never divided until the 20th century.


The St. Nicholas’ Cathedral in Famagusta

The Ottomans invaded Cyprus in 1570, finally beat the Venetian stronghold of Famagusta in 1571, and ruled over Cyprus for over three centuries. This took place in a relatively civilized manner as compared to the Ottoman rule in the Balkans and elsewhere, but they did introduce a Turkish minority later to be the seed of trouble.

In 1878, Cyprus was leased to Great Britain in return for Britain helping the Ottoman Empire hold back Russian influence.
In the 1923 Lausanne Treaty, which established the modern Republic of Turkey, all Turkish interests in Cyprus were written off, a fact that Turkey faithfully upheld until 1954. In 1925, Cyprus became a British crown colony, one of the last additions to the British Empire.

This frustrated many Cypriots hoping for the independence granted to other countries freed from Ottoman rule. In 1931 Cypriots (of all ethnicities, notably) rioted against the colonial rule, which unfortunately descended into violence and arson, led to the suspension of normal colonial rule. Allegedly, this also made the British decide to construct more mosques in order to strengthen the Turkish identity of the Muslim Cypriots, in order that Britain could maintain colonial rule there. Continue Reading →

Now might be a good time to short-sell the Euro

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Here are a couple of items on the likely collapse of the Euro and the EU. The upside, its likely short term pain for long term gain, while the continued existence of the Eurozone as it is, long term pain, loss of freedoms and increased totalitarianism to manage impossible Soviet style economic planning.

Allied Irish Bank has ‘defaulted’ says derivatives body

Banks that sold insurance on the debt of Allied Irish Banks will have to pay out to investors in the nationalised lender’s debt despite complex legal manoeuvres by the Irish authorities to avoid putting the lender into default.

>Allied Irish Bank has 'defaulted' says derivatives body 

While the Allied decision was in line with market expectations and covers only a relatively small number of bonds, it sets a precedent for upcoming decisions on Bank of Ireland debt. Photo: Oli Scarff

Please click the link at the top for the whole story.

 

Then, we have Greece: