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Greek PM Alexis Tsipras calls referendum on bailout terms Greek PM Alexis Tsipras calls referendum on bailout terms
(34 minutes later)
Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras has called a referendum on Sunday 5 July on whether the country should accept or reject a bailout agreement offered by creditors. In a dramatic move that will put Europe on tenterhooks, the Greek prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, has announced he will call a referendum on the bailout accord that international creditors have proposed to keep the debt-stricken country afloat.
Related: Greeks mistrust EU, EC, ECB – but retain some faith in the euro Following an emergency meeting of his cabinet, Tsipras said his leftist-led government had decided a package of austerity measures – made in a last-ditch effort to avert default – would be put to popular vote. The referendum will take place on Sunday 5 July.
“These proposals, which clearly violate the European rules and the basic rights to work, equality and dignity show that the purpose of some of the partners and institutions was not a viable agreement for all parties, but possibly the humiliation of an entire people,” Tsipras said in a televised address to the nation. “After five months of hard negotiations our partners, unfortunately, ended up making a proposal that was an ultimatum towards Greeks democracy and the Greek people. An ultimatum at odds with the founding principles and values of Europe. The values of our common European construction,” Tsipras said in a national address.
“We have been presented with an ultimatum, and it is the historic responsibility of our country and people to answer this ultimatum.”
Describing the referendum as a “historic decision”, Tsipras said he had informed the leaders of France, Germany and Mario Draghi, the head of the European Central Bank, about the decision. “I asked them to extend our current bailout by a few days so that this democratic process could take place,” he said.
Greeks would be asked whether they wanted to accept, or reject tax rises and pension cuts amounting to €8bn that the EU, ECB and International Monetary Fund have set as a condition to release desperately needed bailout funds. Greece’s current rescue programme, already extended once, expires on 30 June.
“These proposals, which clearly violate the European rules and the basic rights to work, equality and dignity, show that the purpose of some of the partners and institutions was not a viable agreement for all parties, but possibly the humiliation of an entire people,” Tsipras said in a televised address to the nation.
He made the comments hours after flying back from Brussels, where European and International Monetary Fund creditors offered Greece a deal that his government rejected as inadequate.He made the comments hours after flying back from Brussels, where European and International Monetary Fund creditors offered Greece a deal that his government rejected as inadequate.
Athens will ask for an extension of its bailout agreement, which ends on 30 June, by a few days in light of the referendum, he said. Tsipras, catapulted into power on a platform of ending austerity, did not hide his own feelings for the accord. Greeks he said were being subjected to “humiliation and blackmail”, and a never-ending spiral of self-defeating austerity.
More soon “But I will respect the result whatever it is,” he said.
The Greek parliament, in an emergency step, would convene on Saturday so the referendum could be called in line with the constitution.
Related: Greeks mistrust EU, EC, ECB – but retain some faith in the euro
“These proposals, which clearly violate the European rules and the basic rights to work, equality and dignity, show that the purpose of some of the partners and institutions was not a viable agreement for all parties, but possibly the humiliation of an entire people,” Tsipras said in a televised address to the nation.
He made the comments hours after flying back from Brussels, where European and International Monetary Fund creditors offered Greece a deal that his government rejected as inadequate. Athens would ask for an extension of its bailout agreement by a few days in light of the referendum, he said.
Several ministers, emerging from the cabinet session, said they would not support the “barbaric measures” being demanded of Greece by foreign lenders. Greece’s development minister, Panagiotis Lafazanis, said he would urge his fellow citizens to vote against the bailout. He said Greeks would answer “with a resounding no” in the vote.