In the last few years, since Mr. Mitsotakis became Prime Minister, my Greek friends have often criticized me for being idealistically (and unrealistically) bullish about Greece. In short: I had predicted a Golden Age for Greece under only one proviso - that the tsunami of foreign funds coming into Greece in the last 3-4 years and expected to come in in the next few years is spent wisely. Frankly, I was not alone in that assessment. My sense is that most foreign observers had a similar impression.
It only took one dramatic scandal, the train accident, to turn Greece-praising into Greece-bashing. Above all, Greece-bashing on the part of Greeks themselves. The foreign media which I follow have not really engaged in any Greece-bashing.
The Greek blog GreekReporter has now published an article titled "The countless times Greece was convicted by EU courts." The article really provides for some astonishing reading.
EU Court of Justice Convictions
2015: Conviction for violating working hours in hospitals and in general.
2016: Conviction for constant violation of EU waste disposal rules.
2016: Conviction for undermining free movement of capital.
2018: Conviction for failing to recover state aid to Ellinika Nafpigeia.
2019: Conviction for failing to provide support for persons with inabilities.
2019: Conviction for failing to recover state aid to Larco.
2020: Conviction for failing to comply with conservation standards.
2023: Condemnation of Athens over its poor air quality and for failing to take the necessary measures.
European Court of Human Rights
"Greece’s convictions at the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) amount to 948, according to the Greek judge of the Court Yiannis Ktistakis. During a recent briefing of the Parliamentary Committee for the Monitoring of the Decisions of the Court of Human Rights, Ktistakis attributed the low position of Greece in this field to our country’s non-compliance with the sentencing decisions and its inability to eliminate the hotbeds that multiply human rights violations. As he said, a telling comparison can be made with Belgium, a country that has many similarities with Greece, and not only in terms of population. “Belgium has only 285 convictions compared to Greece’s 948 and only 234 pending appeals today as we speak, compared to Greece’s 2,214. In the numbers, Belgium in the last decade 2011-2021, paid 1,745,909 euros for compensation awarded by the European Court, while Greece paid six times more, 28,256,237 euros,” he explained."
I wish someone would comment on the above!
Interesting: I would never have imagined that the number of convictions for both countries are so high.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately I did not find other relevant statistics in the www.
H. Trickler
I was wondering for some time now, how i can find statistics on these matters ... Greece may present similarities with Belgium as far as the numbers, population, land etc but there are several significant differences concerning the cultural and historical heritage. Also Belgium is situated in the heart of Europe. Greece is part of the balkan peninsula. In order to understand the economic conditions in the country, we should know that Greek state paid off its debt from the revolution of 1821 to England in the decade of 2000's . These characteristics with the corruption and the dire straits from a decade of crisis i think contribute to a state that has so many anomalies that are hard to cope with them. There are numerous other factors that play their role on this picture like the bureaucracy which makes the things even worse ... but i would say that the sources for so many convinctions are results of economic, cultural and historical background.
ReplyDeleteBelow are links to the sources about economic/financial matters.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.minfin.gr/web/guest
https://www.bankofgreece.gr/en/the-bank/tasks
https://www.pdma.gr/en/public-debt-strategy/public-debt/level-of-debt-en
https://www.statistics.gr/en/the-greek-economy
On matters regarding European courts you would have to consult the website of the EU.