German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble met in Athens with Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras for only 40 minutes – 10 minutes longer than scheduled – on July 18 although the city center was shut down all day and all demonstrations and gatherings were banned.
As it was a private meeting there was no word on whether they managed to solve Greece’s crushing economic crisis in a brief chat.
Schaeuble followed it up with meetings with Deputy Prime Minister Evangelos Venizelos, Finance Minister Yiannis Stournaras, Minister of Administrative Reform Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Minister of Development Kostis Chatzidakis, Deputy Finance minister Christos Staikouras, Deputy Finance Minister George Mavraganis, the prime minister’s diplomatic advisor Stavros Papastavrou and the MP Christos Lazaridis.
After the deliberation, Venizelos and Schäuble had a private discussion and after the departure of the German Finance Minister, Samaras and Venizelos had a 10-minute talk. Almost nothing was revealed about anything, although Schäeuble reportedly said that “the glass is more than full,” in some kind of cryptic comment about how Greece is coping.
Schaeuble reportedly applauded Samaras for pushing through Parliament a bill that could wind up firing 40,000 public workers as Germany insists on harsh austerity measures in return for backing bailouts, of which it is the biggest contributor. He has said only austerity can save Greece although it’s worsened a six-year recession and put 1.3 million people out of work.
According to media reports, Samaras referred to the efforts made by the government, admitted there may be some delays although it’s been three years for some reforms to begin being implemented and said he’ll pick up the pace of reforms.
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