Athens Macedonian News Agency: News in English, 14-11-04
CONTENTS
[01] DIMAR leader asks President Papoulias to call political leaders'
meeting on debt restructuring
[02] Jean Claude Juncker defended Greece's accession to the eurozone
[01] DIMAR leader asks President Papoulias to call political leaders'
meeting on debt restructuring
ANA/MPA---Democratic Left (DIMAR) leader Fotis Kouvelis on Tuesday met
with Greek President Karolos Papoulias and requested that he call for
a political leaders' meeting so that there can be some understanding
regarding the restructuring of the debt.
Kouvelis noted that the political contradictions and confrontations
between the political parties are acceptable in the context of the
democratic operation, however, they should be left aside and a common
political ground on the debt negotiations should be sought, otherwise
results will be adverse for the society.
On his part, Papoulias said he was glad to hear about understanding
despite the differences between the political parties, noting however,
that this is necessary for national issues too. "This is my position,
this is what I told prime minister (Antonis Samaras) and (SYRIZA leader
Alexis) Tsipras as well, Papoulias noted.
[02] Jean Claude Juncker defended Greece's accession to the eurozone
ANA/MPA---The President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker
on Tuesday defended Greece's accession to the eurozone during his
presentation of Helmut Kohl's book in Frankfurt in which former German
Chancellor claims that Gerhard Schroeder prematurely accepted Greece
in the eurozone.
According to Deutche Welle's Greek service, Juncker said before an
audience of 100 journalists that attended the book's presentation:
"We did not allow Greece to be among the first group of countries that
would adopt the euro, because it was not ready for that. However, later
Greeks made significant efforts".
He acknowledged, however, that the Europeans "were misled by a wrong
statistics presentation of the data" noting that this mistake would
not be repeated. He also referred to the Greek people's achievements
in the last four years and reminded that we should not seek scapegoats
for "the Greek politicians' wrongdoings in the past decades". Moreover,
Juncker expressed his disappointment over the revival of the resentment
clichés in Greece and in Germany.
Juncker underlined that the "introduction of the euro is a policy of
peace" adding that a currency war between France and Germany would
burst out during the crisis if there was no common currency. The common
currency "made the European integration non reversible...it protects
Europe...without it things would be bad for us".
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