World View: Angela Merkel Praises Canada for Not 'Living on Borrowed Money'

This morning’s key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Angela Merkel praises Canada for not ‘living on borrowed money’
• Greece postpones request for extension of austerity requirements
• Spain’s debt spiral accelerates at high speed
• In ironic twist, Assad’s planes kill ally’s kidnap victims

Angela Merkel praises Canada for not ‘living on borrowed money’

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, on a trip to Ottawa to meet withCanada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper, said that Germany intends todo “everything we can to maintain” the euro. She renewed her call forfiscal discipline by praising Canada for not “living on borrowedmoney,” saying it should serve as a model for Europe. Almosteveryone in Europe is on vacation right now, but the next major eventon the euro timeline is expected to occur on September 12, whenGermany’s Verfassungsgericht (Federal Constitutional Court) will issuea verdict on whether the euro zone rescue plan for Spain and othercountries is legal under European treaties and the Germanconstitution. AP and Bloomberg

Greece postpones request for extension of austerity requirements

News reports have been swirling with rumors that Greece’s primeminister Antonis Samaras plans to ask for a two-year extension onmeeting austerity requires imposed by the EU and the IMF in return forits third bailout package. However, no sooner did the swirling start,but it became clear that European leaders are very hostile to the ideaof giving Greece any more time, especially since the extension wouldhave to be funded by an additional 20 billion euros in bailout funds.Austria’s foreign minister, for example, said Thursday that “We needto create ways to be able to eject someone from the eurozone,”referring to Greece. And so Samaras has decided to postpone hisextension request until an EU leaders’ summit scheduled for October8-9. Kathimerini

Spain’s debt spiral accelerates at high speed

ECB lending to Spain’s financial institutions (FTA)

 It doesn’t come as much of a surprise that the Spanish financialsector is having to increasingly rely on loans from the EuropeanCentral Bank (ECB). However, analysts are surprised that theborrowing is accelerating very rapidly. FT Alphaville

In ironic twist, Assad’s planes kill ally’s kidnap victims

In the welter of conflicting stories about various types of atrocitiesin Syria, readers may recall that in May, Syrian opposition fighterskidnapped a busload of Shia Lebanese citizens as they traveled back toLebanon from a religious pilgrimage to Iran. (From June: Hezbollah leader Nasrallah’s defiant threat to Syrian kidnappers backfires) All but 11 of the kidnap victimswere freed in May, but the fate of the 11 remaining has been inquestion. Iran, of course, is a close ally of Syria’s leader Basharal-Assad, whose army launched a bloody bombing assault on residentialneighborhoods of Azaz, as we reported yesterday. Now, Abu Ibrahim, head of a Syrian oppositionmilitia, says that the 11 were being held in Azaz, and that they werethe victims of al-Assad’s bombs:

“Four Lebanese were killed. The other seven are incritical condition as a result of the severe bombardment. [SyrianPresident’s] Bashar Assad’s warplanes bombarded the buildings andmedical centers in Azaz.”

If the claims are true, it would be ironic if al-Assads warplaneskilled his own Shia allies, when all he really wanted to do wasexterminate a few Sunni women and children. Daily Star (Beirut)
 
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