Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Does the IMF debt relief demand support Greece or support Tsipras' surrender?


France's former and current minister of finance agree on debt relief for Greece













You can see it as something positive that, finally, the IMF says that substantial debt relief or debt reduction for Greece is needed and puts it as a condition for IMF engagement in the envisaged agreement between Greece and its creditors.

Sure, it is something the new Greek government of Tsipras has asked for from the beginning, when it started negotiating a deal with its creditors. But I wonder why suddenly now, when the Greek parliament has to decide today (Wednesday) whether it will support the deal struck by Tsipras in which he himself does not believe, the IMF supports one of Tsipras' demands.

Is the sudden move of the IMF meant to convince the Greek parliament that it should support Tsipras' surrender to the creditors? Or, even if the masters of the IMF (Europe and the US) have not thought of the sudden switch to debt relief as a trick to influence the vote in the Greek parliament, does it not serve that purpose?

PS: I just read (Wednesday, 12:15) that France agrees with the IMF debt relief demand. Will that help making the Greek parliament support Tsipras' surrender? Don't forget that the French already helped the Tsipras government prepare the 'compromise' surrender... Does Tsipras hope he will regain policy space once he has the Greek parliament faithfully supporting him in a deal he himself sees as nonsensical, or only making sense to prevent worse?

PS2: I just read (Wednesday, 14:00) in Le Figaro that the central committee of Syriza rejects the deal between Tsipras and the creditors.

Le comité central de Syriza rejette l'accord
Le comité central du parti d'Alexis Tsipras a rejeté l'accord signé à Bruxelles, rapporte Stathis Kouvelakis, membre du comité central de Syriza sur sa page Facebook. Il publie une déclaration rédigée par 108 des 201 membres du comité central de Syriza.


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