GERMANY’S EX-FOREIGN minister Joschka Fischer has warned that Angela Merkel’s procrastination on assisting Greece could turn the euro-zone currency crisis into a “European tragedy”.
He told German university students on Wednesday night that he was “seriously concerned” about the future of the European project, a decade after he made his now famous call for an EU federation at Berlin’s Humboldt University.
Five years after leaving politics, Fischer is a columnist and visiting professor at the Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf. It was here he delivered a withering assessment of the EU’s efforts so far to aid Greece, reserving his greatest scorn for chancellor Angela Merkel.
“This crisis is so serious that we cannot just wait around,” he said. “This is the worst crisis Europe has experienced, more serious than I could have imagined, and it could end in tragedy.”
Referring to Berlin’s insistence on International Monetary Fund (IMF) approval for any Greek aid, Fischer added: “I simply don’t understand how the fire brigade is standing around and scratching its head instead of manning the pumps and helping out.”
Fischer (62) personalised his attack by describing the policies pursued by Merkel, whom he recently dubbed “Frau Germania”, as a betrayal of Helmut Kohl’s European policies.
Hours after he lectured in Düsseldorf, Czech president Vaclav Klaus took to the podium of Berlin’s Humboldt University to tell students how, in his view, the EU had already failed because euro-zone membership had deprived Greece of the means to solve its economic problems.
The most recent phase of the European project had, he said, been nothing more than “unification, regimentation and standardisation”, with no sign of the promised benefits.
“The key question for me is whether the existence of the Lisbon Treaty has brought more democracy, freedom and prosperity to the European continent. My answer is no,” he said. Concealed behind the treaty was the wish of “Eurocrats” to better organise Europe. “That would be best organised in a dictatorship,” he added.
While Mr Klaus drew from his standard EU-critical repertoire, the pessimism of the Europhile Mr Fischer’s attracted more attention. Some German analysts agree wholeheartedly with his views, but others suggest Berlin’s problem is less a lack of political will to aid Greece than a problem of poor political communication.
“Many people were surprised it has taken Berlin so long to realise that Greece is a European problem needing a European solution,” said Dr Daniela Schwarzer of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs. “Berlin has a clear position on Greece – to do everything possible to preserve euro stability – but German politicians are not doing enough to manage public opinion in Europe.”
Back in Düsseldorf, Mr Fischer ended his speech at Heinrich Heine University, named after the German poet, with a fresh take on one of his best-known lines. Where Heine once wrote: Denk ich an Deutschland in der Nacht/ bin ich um den Schlaf gebracht(At night when I think of Germany/I am robbed of sleep), Fischer said: "Replace Germany with Europe then you come close to my current mood."