Cyprus closes the shutters as it announces capital controls
by Open Europe blog team
Some more details coming out about the much talked about capital controls in Cyprus (details via @MatinaStevis and RANsquawk):
A New Business Model for Cyprus
by Acturca
Today?s Zaman (Turkey) 27 March 2013, p. 17 Español Français Javier Solana * Madrid ? Once again, Europe has peered into the abyss. But the tentative agreement between Cyprus and the troika (the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund, and the European Central Bank) probably means that the worst has been avoided. Big losses for
Cyprus: the Mouse That Roared
by Acturca
RUSI Analysis, 27 March 2013 By Professor Michael Clarke * The eastern Mediterranean has been spring loaded for an international political crisis for many months now. Is the Cypriot Euro crisis the mouse that finally sets off the trap? The eastern Mediterranean, and particularly Cyprus, has been spring loaded for an international crisis for many
A punishment, not a solution, for Cyprus (Opinion)
from EurActiv.com
There is no doubt that the coming months are going to be dramatic for Cypriots, writes Nikos Chrysoloras.
Cyprus imposes severe capital controls
from FT.com – World, Europe
Cypriot authorities announce limits on credit card transactions and money withdrawals as banks prepare to reopen for the first time in two weeks
Investors wrestle with eurozone angst
from FT.com – World, Europe
The resurgence of worries over the eurozone has rendered the single currency, once again, traders? favoured proxy for the market?s risk appetite
Morning Brief: Cyprus reaches new bailout deal with European regulators
from FP Passport by Elias Groll
MAIN FOCUS: Sombre mood after Cyprus deal | 26/03/2013
from euro|topics
Cyprus’s President Nicos Anastasiades spoke to his countrymen on Monday, defending the bailout deal reached in Brussels as painful but necessary. While the stock markets rose initially in reaction, the country’s banks remained closed. Commentators doubt that the Mediterranean island has really been rescued and consider the monetary union to have yet again been exposed as fundamentally flawed.
Greek Cypriots show faith in church to save island
from Hurriyet Daily News
Greek Cypriots flocked to Sunday mass hoping the island’s powerful Orthodox Church..
Forget Cyprus and enjoy the risk rally
The party is far from over for equities and other risk assets, with money leaving havens in pursuit of positive yield, says Erik Nielsen
Europe gets real ? not before time
The right plan for Cyprus has been put in place but only after a dreadful series of unforced errors
The making of a German Europe
A project designed to avoid any notion of conflict has provoked a resurgence of hostility towards Berlin, writes Gideon Rachman
A grand coalition with Silvio is hard to swallow for Bersani, but…
by Open Europe blog team
The leader of Italy’s centre-left Democratic Party, Pier Luigi Bersani, is in an unenviable position right now. He has been asked by Italian President Giorgio Napolitano to go and meet pretty much everyone (trade unions, employers’ associations, political parties) and see if he can get the support he needs to command a majority in Italy’s hung Senate. Bersani will report back to Napolitano on Thursday, and is due to meet a delegation from Silvio Berlusconi’s PdL party this afternoon.
Europeans? love-hate relationship with interdependence
from open Democracy News Analysis – by Heather Grabbe
Europeans both love and hate globalisation. They benefit from mobility across cosmopolitan Europe and there can be no return to the sovereign nation-state. But they want to limit their liabilities both to other EU countries and the global economy.
After all, is it worth staying in Eurozone?
from Blogactiv by Dimitris Rapidis
The Cyprus bailout deadlock came to remind us that the Eurozone establishment is something we had really over-appreciated 11 years ago. The idea behind the single currency structure was to decrease instability, increase growth and smooth structural deficiencies between member-states. Nowadays, the conclusion is that Eurozone is a forum of European member-states with no decisional power and Germany behaving as anauthoritarian emperor imposing any decision in favor of its interests.
Does Emigration Put Spain?s Health and Pensions System At Risk?
from A Fistful Of Euros » A Fistful Of Euros by Edward Hugh
According to the Economist?s Buttonwood, ?desperate times require desperate measures?. I am sure this is right, times in Spain are certainly getting desperate and many of the measures being implemented in Brussels, far from representing radical and innovative solutions look much more like continually closing the barn door after the horse has bolted.
German neo-Nazi cell bigger than previously thought
from Hurriyet Daily News
German security officials have compiled a list of 129 people who are suspected of helping the neo-Nazi cell that waged a racist killing spree over a period of 7 years.
ETA warns Spain of ‘negative consequences’ after refusal to negotiate
from Hurriyet Daily News
The armed Basque independentist group ETA warned that the Spanish government’s refusal to negotiate with its leaders will have ‘negative consequences’.
Italy: Bersani failing to form government wouldn’t automatically mean new elections
by Open Europe blog team
There were rumours of a further postponement until Good Friday, but Italy’s centre-left leader Pier Luigi Bersani has confirmed he will meet President Giorgio Napolitano tomorrow and report on the outcome of coalition talks with other political parties. The truth is talks haven’t gone particularly well. At the moment, Bersani doesn’t seem to have the numbers to win a preliminary vote of confidence in the Italian Senate – absent which the new government wouldn’t be allowed to enter office.
MAIN FOCUS: Bailout deal for Cyprus reached | 25/03/2013
from euro|topics
The Euro Group finance ministers and the Cypriot government agreed on a ten billion rescue package on Sunday night, averting state bankruptcy for Cyprus. In return the country must downsize its banking sector and involve it in the bailout programme. Some commentators fear a Europe-wide capital flight. Others stress that Iceland got back on its feet after taking similar measures.
The Cyprus Eurocrisis: the beginning of the end of the Eurozone?
from open Democracy News Analysis – by Nicos Trimikliniotis
EU accession in 2004 did little if anything to make runaway bankers accountable; on the contrary, the so-called institutional ?independence? of the Central Bank making the Governor accountable to the ECB rather than having any democratic accountability to the people who would be immediately affected, made the bankers more unaccountable.
Could Cyprus leave the Eurozone but stay in the EU?
from Open Europe blog
Cyprus crisis shows Europe cannot perpetually move in one direction only
by Open Europe blog team
In an op-ed yesterday’s Times, Mats Persson argued that:
No matter how the nail-biting drama in Cyprus ends, the eurozone has never been this close to waving goodbye to a member. Yesterday afternoon the deputy leader of the ruling party claimed that his country was hours away from agreeing an emergency package of tax rises and spending cuts to secure the EU?s ?10 billion rescue loan.
Sarkozy slams ‘unfair and unfounded’ corruption charge
from Hurriyet Daily News
Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy denounced charges against him in connection..
Cyprus finds not all nations are equal
The treatment of the island shows that the eurozone is a group where the interests of the big nations stand highest, says Christopher Pissarides
France tests post-Cyprus bond demand
from FT.com – World, Europe
The issue, the longest dated bond from France since March 2010, raised ?4.5bn, much more than expected, and priced at a slight premium
Cyprus adds to Europe?s confusion
The bailout is not significant for the eurozone as a whole but is another occasion for anger with the European project to bubble to the surface, writes Martin Wolf
Sweden?s Renewable Majority ? surpassed the EU?s target 2020 already 2012
from Blogactiv by Kaj Embrén
51%. The majority of Sweden?s energy comes from renewable sources.
It is an achievement that has surpassed both the EU?s target of 49% by 2020 and the Swedish parliament adopted target of 50 percent in 2020.The seeds to this success can be traced back to the establishment of the official Oil Commission in 2005, which was charged with reducing Sweden?s dependence on oil.
The Cypriot bailout: A catalogue of farce
by Open Europe blog team
Having followed the twists and turns of the Cypriot bailout for the last couple of weeks we?ve been struck by how ? even by the standards of eurozone crisis management ? it has been spectacularly mishandled often with farcical results (FAZ’s Klaus-Dieter Frankenberger described it as “hara-kiri crisis management”). Here’s our highlights:
Frankenstein Roma: the economic fallacy
from open Democracy News Analysis – by Valeriu Nicolae
The governments of many Roma countries of origin are guilty of resorting to an economic fallacy that prevents the social inclusion of Roma ? both at home and in western Europe. This fallacy must be exposed, and abandoned.
Reconstructing the Czech state
from open Democracy News Analysis – by Jan Hornát
While clientelism, corruption and nepotism are still an ailing element of post-communist political reality in the Czech Republic, a new civic initiative seeks to bring more transparency and accountability to the Czech state. Can it succeed?
Syria is our business too: why Europe must take the lead on efforts to end the civil war
from open Democracy News Analysis – by Ulrich Speck
Simply waiting until the fight is over looks like a realpolitik option, but it is a recipe to push Syria only further into disaster. The stalemate can last for years. Europe must act now ? to prevent a humanitarian tragedy and to protect its vital interests.
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