Word: greeks
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...Last month, Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou blamed his country's economic meltdown on "an attack on the euro zone by certain other interests, political or financial. We are being targeted, particularly with an ulterior motive or agenda." And according to Spain's El Pais newspaper, agents at the country's National Intelligence Center are investigating whether "attacks by investors and the hostility shown by some sectors of the British and U.S. press" amount to "collusion." "None of what is happening, including editorials in some foreign media with their apocalyptic commentaries, is happening by chance or innocently," Spanish Transport Minister...
...there just one alleged plot involved. The colorful Greek Deputy Prime Minister Theodoros Pangalos this week claimed that the Nazi theft of Greek gold during World War II was to blame for the country's ballooning deficit, which has shaken investors' confidence in the euro, causing it to plunge in value against the dollar in recent weeks...
...blame is certainly going around. Many conspiracists accuse "foreign hands," more specifically Anglo-Saxons, for the Greek and Spanish crises, arguing that they have always hated the euro and are now using their hedge funds and media operations to bring it down. Some suggest that speculators are attacking the euro to block moves toward tougher European Union regulation of the market. Others, like European Central Bank chief economist Jürgen Stark, suggest people are perpetrating a ruse to hide the U.K.'s budget deficit. "It's astonishing to see where most of the criticism of the euro is coming...
Begg sees a deeper purpose behind the blame game, as politicians try to mitigate the public criticism that will accompany the inevitable austerity measures needed to fix the Greek and Spanish economies. "There is an Italian concept of vincolo esterno, or external constraint," he says. "It is a device a canny politician can use to say, 'We must do this or we will be eaten alive.' Although the conspiracy theories are preposterous, they help prepare for the reforms which are needed...
...spat between the two E.U. members is evidence of the how old enmities in Europe linger. Greek-German relations have been largely friendly in recent decades, the horrors of the war papered over by the benefits of modern European cooperation. Today, 2.5 million Germans flock to Greek beaches and ancient sites each year - more than from any other country except Britain - their euros welcomed by hoteliers and restaurant owners. But beneath the friendly hospitality, for Greeks, bitter memories of the war still linger...