Cyprus-Forum.com

[Paphitis]

You're both friggin mad.

The recent loans are to pay out already existing loans with very high interest rates on maturity. The interest on these loans is far reduced. They are bail outs.

But of course they are still loans that need to be paid back but not at 17%. There was also a 130 billion haircut in the form of write offs.

[erolz66]

are you sure that was the problem and not greek people not paying tax...

I'm sure.

The average Greek worker had tax deducted at source from their wage packets (some of the smallest wage earnings in the whole EU). Some of the problems were induced by the foreigners with holiday homes that made the country seem more populated than it was, yet they paid no tax to Greece, and again, it was mostly foreign holiday-home owners that had the swimming pools which did not have permits and avoided the taxes. All these things have now been addressed - and still they find new excuses with which to hammer the average Greek.

What has been ignored, I must agree, is the super-wealthy who have tax havens abroad. Now, this is a global problem, certainly a major problem for all European states, especially Great Britain, and this should be what is tackled first and foremost. But of course, this super-wealthy subculture includes politicians, and bankers and they are untouchable - in ALL countries not just Greece or Cyprus.

Greece doesn't need loans. It needs to be left alone to do what it does best - work and live. It doesn't need to be force-fed money, with attachments, that goes straight back to Germany yet leaves the Greeks looking like they OWE something.

Greeks do NOT owe anyone anything!

Yet, the rest of the world owes, oooohhh, so much ....

LOL - as ever it is all the fault of 'foreigners'. Still you are slipping GiG - you missed an opportunity to blame the ottomans / turks. Surely tax evasion is so rife in Greece because under ottoman rule not paying your taxes was an act of patriotism - it is just many Greeks today have not realised that they are no longer ruled from Istambul as far as taxes go.

As for the argument that there is a problem with the 'super wealthy' avoiding their tax in Greece, no different from how they do in other countries, this is again classic GiG distortion and denial of factual reality. Same old same old as ever. The factual reality is that in Greece unlike in other comparable countries the biggest tax evaders are NOT the SUPER rich but just the rich, the professional classes in medicine, engineering, education, accounting, financial services and law. This is NOT 'just like other countries' at all. As ever when factual reality does not suit the propaganda objective just deny, distort and ignore factual reality for something that does meet the propaganda objective needs.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/s ... al-classes

[Cap]

I think this might be of interest to CiG.


www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/08/22/wh ... story.html

[GreekIslandGirl]

I think this might be of interest to CiG.


http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/0 ... story.html

This says it all...

Although my lineage is pure Greek, I grew up with American attitudes about cheating.

Don't need to know any more.

- Americans are pure fantasists.

[Paphitis]

I think this might be of interest to CiG.


http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/0 ... story.html

This says it all...

Although my lineage is pure Greek, I grew up with American attitudes about cheating.

Don't need to know any more.

- Americans are pure fantasists.

Are pure Greeks cheats?

I'm pure Hellene and I love cheating! It's a bit of a sport!

[GreekIslandGirl]

LOL - as ever it is all the fault of 'foreigners'. Still you are slipping GiG - you missed an opportunity to blame the ottomans / turks.

The whole of European civilization has suffered as a result of the ottoman invasions - it is a matter of fact and only worth repeating/reminding (as you have done) when one downplays the present harm continued by having neighbours like Turks.

The start of Greece's most recent downturn can be traced back to the lost revenues from the fires started by the Turkish state:

Former Turkish PM's arson admission fuels anger


Greek politicians reacted angrily on Monday following the admission by former Turkish Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz that Turkish secret agents intentionally started forest fires in Greece in the 1990s as part of state-sponsored sabotage.

The claims are not new and were common knowledge on the islands of the eastern Aegean which were particularly hard hit by wildfires in the 1990s. But Yilmaz’s comments -- part of an interview published in the Turkish daily newspaper Birgun over the weekend -- are the first admission by an official source that Ankara was funding subversive activities in Greece.

According to Yilmaz, who served as premier three times in the 1990s, agents of the Turkish secret service set fire to Greek forests during the leadership of his archrival Tansu Ciller, from 1995 to 1998. During that period major forest fires caused huge damage on the islands of the eastern Aegean and in Macedonia.

The news sparked political outrage Greece on Monday. Foreign Ministry spokesman Grigoris Delavekouras said the claims were “serious and must be investigated,” adding that Athens was awaiting a briefing from Ankara.

Conservative New Democracy’s shadow foreign minister Panos Panayiotopoulos said the revelations “cast heavy shadows over Greek-Turkish relations” and called on Turkey recompense Greece for losses incurred.

Giorgos Karatzaferis, the leader of the right-wing Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS), was indignant and triumphant, noting that he had been accused of extremism when as an MP he had accused Turkish secret agents of arson in Greece. “Now, from the lips of former Turkish premier, we have an admission to the crime,” he said.

http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_ar ... 011_419985

Ottomans started the destruction and Turks continue it ...

[Oceanside50]

I think this lady has it wrong, that the ottoman system created the mistrust in givernment.. I think the problem manifested itself in Greece and Cyprus because of geography the mountainous terrain kept the Greeks separated and because of this fact Greeks and Cypriots tend to be very clannish.. To this day Spartan feuds still resonate as well as in Crete.. In Cyprus the people that tend to be the most clannish are the paphites, the mountainous terrain kept them hidden from the rest of Cyprus and only resently have they become visible to the rest of Cyprus and the Greek world..

[GreekIslandGirl]

Lol - and yet, the Greeks are among the best-traveled peoples in the world, and have been for thousands of years....

For example -

Pausanias (/pɔːˈseɪniəs/; Greek: Παυσανίας Pausanías; c. AD 110 – c. 180)[1] was a Greek traveler and geographer of the 2nd century AD, who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. He is famous for his Description of Greece (Ἑλλάδος περιήγησις Hellados Periegesis)[2] a lengthy work that describes ancient Greece from firsthand observations, and is a crucial link between classical literature and modern archaeology. This is how Andrew Stewart assesses him:
A careful, pedestrian writer, he is interested not only in the grandiose or the exquisite but in unusual sights and obscure ritual.

wiki

[supporttheunderdog]

the latesthttp://famagusta-gazette.com/greek-banks-hammered-after-ecb-stands-up-to-greece-p27498-69.htm

Is there a possibility Greece will have to go through a banking haircut as in Cyprus?

The Germans in particular seem keen to hold Greece to its bargains that bailed it out of the merde last time around.

[B25]

The phrase ' Beggar's can't be choosers' springs to mind.

I would have liked Greece to succeed but being broke as they are, they are stuck, however much hot air they blow.