Greeks turn their ire on the capital's goose-stepping guards - by Nick Squires
It was the equivalent of launching an attack on the Changing of the Guard outside Buckingham Palace. Gangs of Greek protesters, incensed by Saturday's fatal shooting of a 15-year-old schoolboy by a police officer, hurled rocks and other missiles yesterday at the ceremonial guard outside Greece's parliament. The presidential guards are one of the country's most familiar tourist sights, famous for their theatrical goose-stepping, skirted tunics and distinctly unmilitary black pom-poms on the end of their hobnailed boots. Normally they stand stock-still in parliament's dazzling white marble forecourt, in front of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Greeks accuse the centre-Right government of Mr Karamanlis of cronyism and corruption. A scandal over a property deal involving a powerful Greek Orthodox monastery led to the government's majority being reduced to just one seat in the 300-member parliament last month after Mr Karamanlis axed an MP. The economy suffers from crippling public debt and is suffering still from the budget blowout from the 2004 Olympics. The OECD predicts that Greece's economic growth rate will dip to a sluggish 2 per cent next year, as the manufacturing sector shrinks at a record pace.
Note EU-Digest: There is nothing sluggish in today's world economy about a 2% growth rate as this article of the Telegraph seems to imply. Certainly much better than Britain's economic growth at present. Fortunately also for Greece is that they are part of the Euro Zone, which has been a stabilizing factor of their economy. As usual this report by the Telegraph, like most of their articles covering the EU there is a distasteful undertone of Eurosceptisism.
No comments:
Post a Comment