The first foreign media reaction to the “Agreekment,” Greece’s agreement with its European partners, were divided. The negotiations marathon and the new agreement have been put under a microscope by journalists across the world.
The German Bild published an article entitled “86 billion euros to Greece!” which mostly referred to the 17-hour meeting between European leaders in Brussels. Furthermore, the Frankfurter Allgemeine noted that Greece had reached an agreement with its partners, in order to receive funding, while also stressing the fact that Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras had a dispute with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, regarding the new 50-billion-euro fund.
Die Welt appeared more neutral, with an article entitled “Eurozone summit resulted in agreement on the Greek issue, while Der Spiegel’s article simply said: “The Eurozone countries reached agreement with Greece.” Die Zeit used Merkel’s words to describe the situation, with the title “The agreement advantages outweigh the disadvantages.”
Meanwhile, the British Guardian, continued to live-blog the developments on the Greek issue, in an article titled “Greece and Eurozone reach agreement on bailout talks,” where the newspaper provided a detailed description of the negotiation process.
“Speaking to reporters shortly after 8 am EU president Donald Tusk said that long negotiations had finally produced an ‘agreekment,’” noted Telegraph, adding that now Tsipras “must push through pension, market and privatization reforms, in return for a commitment from EU leaders to start talks on a bailout.”
According to Bloomberg news agency, Tsipras had to swallow the worst. “Creditor governments essentially ordered the one-time Communist youth activist to adopt unquestioned capitalism to earn aid of as much as 86 billion euros ($95 billion) and keep Greece in the euro.”
“The Greek government has accepted practically everything,” Prime Minister Joseph Muscat of Malta said to Bloomberg. “It accepted all the crucial and important points.”
“There is a lot of anger in the streets of Greece and other European countries in the way the country has been humiliated. Under the latest deal, EU members’ decision to keep Euro 50 billion worth of Greece’s assets out of the country’s reach has resulted in renewed resentment. The deal is a harsher version of what the people had already rejected,” wrote the newspaper Business Standard.
Finally, the French Le Mond noted that Greece will remain in the Eurozone, but it will have to pay the heavy price of strict and drastic reforms.
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