Monday, March 27, 2023
 
 

Obama’s Greece Visit – Dancing around the Greek debt minefield

- Advertisement -

First and foremost it was a great relief to see U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew step off the plane and quietly slip into the Presidential super-limo in Athens November 15, while President Obama was left handling the airport arrival and protocol formalities with Greek Defense Minister Panos Kammenos. While Obama’s final overseas trip is well staffed, no other cabinet-level official is traveling with President Obama on this (first) stop, which tells you Washington clearly understood precisely what Greek Prime Minister Tsipras is looking for.
American pre-departure statements about the Greece stop have sought to put a broader geopolitical perspective on the visit. The Greek side has given lip service to most of that before Obama arrived and focused on debt relief almost exclusively, with just a bit of attention to Cyprus, Turkey and the ongoing refugee crisis. President Obama’s statements routinely contain the checklist of issues Washington sees as important.
What we did not hear from President Obama on his first day in Greece was a promise to make locking in debt relief for Greece a priority before his term expires January 20. Instead he took a much more subtle approach arguing the need for Washington to convince Greece’s creditors to take steps to get Greece on the path for a sustainable recovery and to support a growth agenda. “We cannot look at austerity as a strategy” Obama said a joint press conference after meeting PM Tsipras November 15, also noting that Greece “needed space” for its structural reforms and nascent recovery to take hold. So what we have from President Obama is a pledge that he understands Greece’s sacrifices and will continue doing what he has been doing, but no indication that his successor will.
It remains to be seen how much work will be accomplished at tonight’s official dinner for President Obama at the Presidential Palace in Athens. Surely Jack Lew and Finance Minister Euclides Tsakalotos will have time to plot next steps on the debt issue over dinner, or perhaps Wednesday morning. Assuming of course that they make it to tonight’s dinner, with various Greek anarchist gangs loudly threatening to disrupt the proceedings if they possibly can. To be continued.

- Advertisement -

Subscribe to our newsletter

Co-founder and Executive Director for Global Economics and Southeast Europe at NE Global Media.  Former US diplomat with previous assignments in Eastern Europe, the UN, SE Asia, Greece, across the Balkans, as well as Washington DC.

Latest

Africa’s porous borders promote transnational crimes rather than deeper integration

For positive continental regimes to succeed, there must be both conscious and concerted efforts, as well as political will, from all states to help eliminate transnational crimes while fostering integration across the whole of Africa through trade.

Kazakhstan’s new parliament could usher in green energy, rare earth investments

Kazakhstan held internationally monitored elections for the Mazhilis, the...

EU-Turkey earthquake relief conference: Time to get serious

The European Union is hosting a reconstruction conference in...

Cambodia’s current government is the face of tropical Fascism

There is no hope that the authoritarianism that the world sees in places like Russia, China and Cambodia can ever be interpreted as a peaceful and benign phenomenon, or that it should be accepted by an implicit racist or discriminatory assumption that some cultures just don’t have a democratic tradition and aren’t quite capable of ever developing one.

Don't miss

Africa’s porous borders promote transnational crimes rather than deeper integration

For positive continental regimes to succeed, there must be both conscious and concerted efforts, as well as political will, from all states to help eliminate transnational crimes while fostering integration across the whole of Africa through trade.

Kazakhstan’s new parliament could usher in green energy, rare earth investments

Kazakhstan held internationally monitored elections for the Mazhilis, the...

EU-Turkey earthquake relief conference: Time to get serious

The European Union is hosting a reconstruction conference in...

Cambodia’s current government is the face of tropical Fascism

There is no hope that the authoritarianism that the world sees in places like Russia, China and Cambodia can ever be interpreted as a peaceful and benign phenomenon, or that it should be accepted by an implicit racist or discriminatory assumption that some cultures just don’t have a democratic tradition and aren’t quite capable of ever developing one.

Energy supply diversification out of Russia’s orbit is a top priority for Bulgaria

Bulgaria intends to diversify its energy resources, including supplying...

Sanctions, sanctions everywhere

On February 24, 2023, the US Government alongside G-7 leaders announced via a White House statement a new set of trade and economic measures...

Free Trade: The magic potion against economic decline

Despite rising internal and external nationalistic pressure, leaders on both sides of the Atlantic should remember that in a time of increasing hostilities from bad actors, retaliatory protectionism toward our allies will do nothing but ensure mutual decline.

Eclipsed by Ukraine concerns, Blinken visits Turkey and Greece

After attending the Munich Security Conference on February on 17-19, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken departed for a brief regional mission to Turkey...

A Belarusian politician, fraudster and businessman kept money in Credit Suisse

It was the last summer day of 2008. An Audi was waiting in line to leave Belarus for Poland. Petr Kalugin, a House of Representatives deputy,...

US & Philippines agree to ramp up defense cooperation

The US and Philippines announced on February 2 a substantial expansion of their existing military cooperation arrangements, increasing the number of facilities that American...

Goodbye, Jumbo

The 747 aircraft design has had a total production run of 54 years, with 1,574 aircraft delivered including the US President’s Air Force One, along with several replacements, making it the aviation industry’s most important workhorse of the 1980s-90s.

Bulgaria again heads towards elections

Bulgaria is now moving towards its fifth parliamentary election in two years as a result of the failure of the latest group of elected...

Croatia advances to the EU mainstream

 Croatia took a decisive step January 1 towards the mainstream of the European project by adopting the Euro as its currency while at the...