The President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker has told EU members to “show respect towards Italy” as its new government takes power and not repeat the mistakes the EU made with Greece.
Juncker told German media at the weekend that the “dignity of the Greek people (was) trodden under foot” by the EU when Alexis Tsipras became Prime Minister in 2015.
He warned that the lecturing of Greece by German-speaking countries had been unhelpful and was to be avoided as the new Italian coalition government headed by Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte settles into power.
“That must not happen again in the present case with Italy,” he said. “I absolutely do not want to get involved in questions of domestic Italian politics.”
Conte’s government has promised to scrap the austerity measures recommended by the EU, but Juncker said at the weekend that Italy had to deal with its problems and not seek blame with the EU. He said he was “not at all in favour of giving lessons to Rome” the way the EU had with Athens.
“I absolutely do not want to get involved in questions of domestic Italian politics,” he added.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras referred to Italy last week when he was speaking at the 26th General Assembly of the Greek Tourism Confederation (SETE) in Athens.
“Europe must understand that insistence on austerity without a horizon of hope erodes the legitimacy of economic goals and leads to division within societies. When Democracy fails, it inevitably leads to dangerous albeit justified reactions from the people,” Tsipras said.