The visit of Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras in Moscow was a failure as he got nothing but vague promises from Vladimir Putin, says a Deutsche Welle article. According to writer Barbara Wesel, the Greek Prime Minister has not learned anything since the day he took office and his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin was a political loss for him. Alexis Tsipras has shown “the same blend of stubbornness, denial of reality and aggression towards his benefactors,” Wesel says. According to the article, Mr. Tsipras played his last political card but left Moscow empty-handed: “The Greek Prime Minister was willing to gamble away his consent to the extension EU’s Russia sanctions and jeopardize solidarity with the EU to gain a new friend and helper in Moscow. He wanted to show the Europeans that he has options other than the excruciating negotiations with Brussels on reforms and regulations, which are supposed to put an end to his acute financial problems.” At the end of the day, he was outsmarted by the Russian president. He endangered his relations with top EU officials with his ill-timed visit to Moscow and all he got in return were “some warm words and vague promises… Mr. Tsipras could not even triumphantly return to Athens to announce the lifting of the Russian import boycott to his peach farmers,” is Wesel’s caustic remark. Further in the report, the writer says that the emphasis given on the Greek-Russian cultural year (2016) or the common religious roots will neither pay the installment to the IMF nor the interest on Greek state bonds. The promises of agricultural cooperation were also ambiguous. As for the Turkish Stream pipeline project Athens is supposed to play a major role in, the completion of the project is a years away and much can change politically by then. Where Mr. Tsipras has lost, argues Wesel, is that in the next two weeks he will have to sit at the negotiating table with the same people he has incensed by his meeting with the Russian president. “Alexis Tsipras is once again proving to be unreliable and unpredictable.” In essence, Vladimir Putin has told the Greek Prime Minister that he has nothing to give. The billions in aid that Greece urgently needs must come from its European partners. “Tsipras has achieved nothing on his trip to Moscow Spring except the brief elation of being an honored guest in the Kremlin and feeling important for half an hour,” the DW article concludes.
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