Czech President: Real cause of Greek financial crisis is euro

In an interview published in Wednesday’s edition of the German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine, Czech president Václav Klaus identifies the euro as the main cause of Greece’s financial crisis. He said that Greece’s budget policy is not to be blamed for the country’s problems and added that the situation could be helped by devaluing the currency by forty percent, which is not possible because Greece no longer has an independent currency. Mr. Klaus says that in terms of economic stability and growth, the euro-zone collapsed a long time ago, but that he still considers it unlikely that European leaders would drop the euro.

Václav Klaus is a fierce opponent of the European Union’s monetary and political centralization and has stated previously that the Czech Republic would benefit if the euro was not introduced in the country.