Cyprus, the communists and anti-European populism

We know the drill now. A eurozone member finds itself in dire financial straits. A cabal of finance ministers, European officials, domestic technocrats and global financiers pushes the stricken national government towards severe public spending cuts and tax rises. The social unrest caused by these policies bleeds into some form of populism, be it left-orientated (Syriza in Greece; 15M in Spain), right-orientated (Golden Dawn in Greece) or somewhere in the fuzzy middle (Beppe Grillo in Italy).

Osborne talking ‘sheer nonsense’ about Cyprus

George Osborne has been humiliatingly been accused of talking “sheer nonsense” by U.S. business and technology news website Business Insider, after Osborne cited the crisis in the Cypriot banking system as an example of why Britain must continue the “painstaking work” of austerity.