Daniel Korski

Greece’s deferred crisis

I am sitting in a busy café in Athens’s fancy Kolonaki district, watching the city’s elite stroll by in their well-fitting couture jeans, as the afternoon sun shimmers off the dusty streets. The women are weighed down by that most delightful of burdens — shopping bags from the local FENDI shop — and the latte I have just ordered comes at the recession-defying price of five euros.  

The regular demonstrations, which block the city centre and bring the police out in force, are now greeted with resignation rather than concern. It may take a little longer to travel home when the shops close -– which they do mid-day on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays (on Sundays they are closed all day) — but summer is on its way. If this is a city in crisis I am sorry that I did not visit in earlier Dionysian times.

Yet at the same time most people know the country is heading towards a severe crisis. Everyone I speak to have friends or relatives who have lost jobs and I am told shops are closing down everywhere. They will have to get used to it, because times will become a lot harder for Greece. Harder, I suspect, than many seem to understand.

Even after European ministers agreed to provide emergency loans to Greece, the situation is fragile. The deal will see €30 billion in loans. The Greek government is taking action to reduce its public deficit from 12 percent to 8 percent of GDP this year. Next week a team from the IMF arrives to examine the options for assistance under a multi-year program. But the country needs to raise about €11 billion by the end of next month to refinance maturing debt and interest charges.

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