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DEBT CRISIS

Support for euro fades as Greek doubts grow

Just over half of Germans think their country would be better off without the euro, a poll suggested on Sunday, as the economy minister reiterated doubts over whether Greece can stay in the single currency.

Support for euro fades as Greek doubts grow
Photo: DPA

The Emnid poll for the Bild am Sonntag newspaper, showed 51 percent of Germans believed Europe’s top economy would be better outside the 17-country eurozone. Twenty-nine percent said it would be worse off.

The survey also showed that 71 percent of Germans wanted Greece to leave the euro if it did not live up to its austerity promises.

Economy Minister Philipp Rösler told Bild am Sonntag there were “considerable doubts whether Greece is living up to its reform promises.”

“The implementation (of the reforms) is faltering. There is still no functioning tax office. Also, almost nothing has happened in terms of the promised privatisation of public assets,” Rösler told the paper.

He added: “If Greece does not fulfil its obligations, there can be no more money. Then Greece would be insolvent.”

Rösler and his Free Democratic Party – junior partners in Germany’s ruling coalition – have frequently expressed doubts about whether Greece is prepared to follow through with the painful reforms necessary to retain the single currency.

Debt-wracked Greece is under immense pressure to carry out a structural reform programme, part of a package worth billions of euros that have been keeping its economy afloat since 2010.

International auditors are currently in Greece, assessing the government’s progress towards reforms seen as essential to get the country back on its feet.

The audit report will determine whether Greece will receive the next tranche of €31.5 billion from its aid programme that it needs to keep the economy running.

Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble reiterated Berlin’s line that the reforms must be carried out to the letter.

“The aid programme is already very accommodating. I do not see room for further concessions,” the minister told the Welt am Sonntag newspaper in an interview.

However, the head of the country’s chambers of commerce called for an end of the debate about Greece’s continued membership of the euro.

“We think it is wrong that, in Germany for example, there is a daily discussion about whether Greece should leave the euro,” said Martin Wansleben.

“That’s not our business. It’s up to the Greeks to decide,” he stressed.

AFP/hc

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FOOTBALL

‘I’m fine — under the circumstances’: Collapsed Danish striker tweets from hospital

Christian Eriksen, the Danish football player who collapsed on the pitch in his country's opening Euro 2020 game, said that he was doing "fine" in an Instagram post from hospital on Tuesday.

'I’m fine — under the circumstances': Collapsed Danish striker tweets from hospital
Danish striker Christian Eriksen tweeted a picture of himself in hospital. Photo: DBU

“I’m fine — under the circumstances, I still have to go through some examinations at the hospital, but I feel okay,” he wrote in a post accompanying a photo of him smiling and giving a thumbs-up while lying in bed.

In a scene that shocked the sporting world and beyond, the 29-year-old Inter Milan midfielder suddenly collapsed on the field in the 43rd minute of Denmark’s Group B game on Saturday against Finland in Copenhagen.

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Medical personnel administered CPR as he lay motionless on the field for about 15 minutes before being carried off the pitch and rushed to hospital. He was later confirmed to have suffered cardiac arrest.

“Big thanks for your sweet and amazing greetings and messages from all around the world. It means a lot to me and my family,” he wrote in Tuesday’s post. “Now, I will cheer on the boys on the Denmark team in the next matches. Play for all of Denmark.”

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