Overseas Greeks are undertaking an intensive effort to inform the US administration as well as parliamentarians how to better understand the economic crisis in Cyprus and America’s obligation to assist.
In a statement, the President of the Coordinated Effort of Hellenes, Andy Manatos, announced on Thursday their group undertook an intensive effort to help top American officials at the White House, State Department, US Senate and House of Representatives better understand the economic crisis of our ally Cyprus and America’s obligation to assist.
“The fact that our group has worked closely with these officials for many years, leads us to believe that they will intervene and help ameliorate this Cyprus crisis”, Manatos pointed out.
In a letter, through emails and in telephone conversations, CEH leaders reminded American officials that “Cyprus is always there when our country desperately need it.”
They underlined that “at America’s urging, Cyprus agreed to confiscate munitions headed to Iran and Hamas. They exploded, devastating Cyprus’ infrastructure and costing its economy, which had just previously run a balanced budget for two years, an over $2 billion loss”.
CEH also said that “Cyprus’ overwhelming evacuation of 25,000 Americans from Lebanon in 2006 was called “absolutely phenomenal” by the Secretary of State while Cyprus valiantly treated America’s injured and dying after the Beirut bombing in 1983, when Turkey refused.
“At America’s urging, Cyprus didn’t veto the EU accession talks for Turkey, a country illegally occupying a third of Cyprus and transferring huge numbers of illegal colonists to alter the country’s demographics.”
CEH also said, “We must be there when Cyprus desperately needs us. It costs us nothing to move the IMF to ease up its unprecedented draconian Cypriot conditions – asking Cyprus, one of the world’s regional financial centers, to destroy depositors’ confidence and Cyprus’ economy by requiring a large ‘haircut’ of all depositors. The Europeans are going to destabilize the Eastern Mediterranean over pocket change. We are talking about resolving 1.5 banks of modest size – something that the FDIC does as a matter of routine course of business and the IMF and EU are managing to turn this routine exercise into a worldwide geo-political-financial disaster.”
CEH attached an article that clearly explains misconceptions about the issue and the lack of wisdom of this IMF action. Concluding, CEH said by “pushing Cyprus toward Russia does no good for America or Israel.”
Cyprus’ House of Representatives is expected to vote on Friday a set of bills designed to overhaul its banking sector to avoid a financial meltdown after it rejected earlier this week a Troika bailout, which called for a levy on all deposits.
The European Central Bank has threatened to withdraw support for the country’s banking sector if a bailout was not agreed by Monday.
Finance Minister Michalis Sarris was returning to the island after a two-day round of meetings in the Russian capital to raise enough to allow for a smoother EU bailout. However, reports indicated the minister is not bringing home any news on an agreement.
Demonstrations are being held outside the Parliament as the island’s second largest bank, Laiki (Popular) Bank is on verge of a collapse. Central Bank Governor Panicos Demetriades has warned that the bills before Parliament relate to the reorganization and restructuring of the banking system, which will ensure that Laiki will continue operating when banks reopen after a week long hiatus in fear of a great outflow of cash.
Otherwise, he added, the bank will go into immediate bankruptcy and termination of its activities with catastrophic consequences for the employees, depositors, the banking system and the economy of the island.
Excluded from the international markets, Cyprus applied last June for financial assistance from the EU bailout mechanism, after its banks sought state support following massive write downs of the Greek bond holdings amounting to €4.5 billion or 25% of the island`s GDP, as result of the Greek sovereign debt haircut. –
