Helmut Schmidt: Greece entered the EU to get political support after the dictatorship

Helmut Schmidt: Greece entered the EU to get political support after the dictatorship

"I did not think that Greece was mature enough but the argument of Valéry Giscard d'Estaing was right," the former German Chancellor supports

Helmut Schmidt: Greece entered the EU to get political support after the dictatorship
In his book entitled "My Europe" former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt argues that "Greece had to be accepted into the Common Market in order to get support, as it had just emerged from dictatorship."
 
He stresses however, that this was the main argument of the then French President, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, and that "this view still has meaning for me."
 
"I did not think that Greece was mature enough to be accepted into the Common Market, but Giscard was convinced: They have only just emerged from dictatorship, as the Spaniards and Portuguese, it is now that we must stand by them in order to enter the European Union," Schmidt says in a chapter of his book where he copies a discussion of former Chancellor with former German Foreign Minister, Joschka Fischer.
 
The Die Zeit newspaper preprinted excerpts from his book, today Thursday.
 
Fischer rejects the politics that Merkel has imposed on Greece to exit the crisis and argues that "the more the Greeks take austerity measures, the more their economy is shrinking and their debt grows. The settlement of old debts is a problem we constantly avoid to solve, because it would cost us. We need a perspective of common debt assumption, call it Eurobond or whatever you want. Without a common assumption of debt the situation can not move forward."
Κλείσιμο
 
Schmidt places special emphasis on the issue of youth unemployment in Greece and other European countries adding that the European Union should take joint action to tackle the problem. He blames Merkel for asking the countries of the South to correct their labour market, social security system and vocational education without a common plan.
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