July 5, 2015

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Ştefan Stoica, 05.07.2015, 12:00

Polling stations have opened in Greece for a crucial referendum on the country’s keeping the European currency and even its EU member status. Roughly 10 million Greeks have been called to vote on the austerity measures requested by international lenders, the European Central Bank, the EU and the IMF in exchange for an international bailout plan. The latest polls showed a very small difference between the two sides; 44.8% of the Greeks are in favour of continuing the austerity measures, 43.4 are against, while 11.3% remain undecided. The far-left government has lately been leading a sustained campaign in the international press against lending conditions. In the Spanish paper ‘El Mundo’, Greece’s Finance Minister Varoufakis has accused the international lenders of ‘terrorism’. In turn, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has urged his supporters to vote for dignity adding that a NO to austerity would allow him to go to Brussels and negotiate a better agreement for the Greek people. Opposition leader Antonis Samaras has pleaded for saying YES to Europe, which might put an end to ‘the government’s responsibility’ as he called it. Irrespective of the result, the Greek Prime Minister pledged to reach an agreement with international financial institutions in 48 hours at the most after the referendum. Germany ruled out the possibility of restructuring Greece’s sovereign debt, in spite of the IMF recommendation and the warning that Athens might need 50 billion euros more by 2018. With a foreign debt totaling more than 320 billion euros, Greece is technically defaulting on debt as of July 1st.

Tens of thousands citizens of the Republic of Moldova are expected to vote during a meeting in Chisinau on a resolution concerning the union of this ex-soviet Romanian-speaking country with neighboring Romania. The meeting has been staged by NGOs from the two countries, who said that ‘only united we can face the challenges of the future, we can live better in our country, a bigger country, without interior borders, without limitations, with a common and prosperous destiny for all Romanians.’ The event is being held in a public area, which also hosted the anti-soviet meetings of 1989 and 1990 and, where in August 1991, another Big National Assembly hailed the proclamation by Parliament in Chisinau of the country’s independence from Moscow. We recall the present Republic of Moldova was created on a part of the Romanian territories annexed by the USSR following an ultimatum in 1940.

A major military drill involving Romanian ships started in the Black Sea, close to the Bulgarian port of Varna. The maneuvers staged by the North Atlantic Alliance until July 12th involve the participation of over 30 ships, 10 planes and 17 hundred soldiers from Bulgaria, Romania, Greece, the United States and Turkey. The naval exercise Breeze 2015, which is being held according to NATO standard procedures, has as its main objective improving operational compatibility in order to be able to face crisis situations.

The 5+1 group, made up of the USA, Great Britain, Russia, China, France, Germany and Iran is today holding talks in Vienna for a historic agreement on Iran’s nuclear file before the deadline of July 7th. According to the BBC, both sides agreed that never before had they been so closer to reaching such an agreement, although there were still major things to negotiate such as the mechanisms on lifting UN sanctions imposed on Iran, inspection procedures and the field of applying Iran’s nuclear technology. The final agreement between Iran and the so-called p5+1 could guarantee the peaceful character of Teheran’s nuclear programme in exchange for lifting international sanctions with negative effects upon Iranian economy.