MEP Stelios Kouloglou (SYRIZA, Greece) met with former Argentinian President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner last week in Buenos Aires for an exchange about the damage caused by the IMF in their respective countries.

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner said:

“It is of great importantce that finally Greece could liberate itself from the control of the IMF and recover its sovereignty.  On the contrary, the current Argentinian government called the IMF to give it the keys to the country under the framework of a very serious economic and social crisis that this same government has helped create. It received the country with 5.9 percent unemployment (the lowest level after decades) and brought it to up to 10 percent and this will continue to increase. The government created a big deficit in the national budget, doubled the sovereign debt, inflation has exploded and there’s a big trade inbalance, which could still rise dramatically if the EU-MERCOSUR FTA – that the governmenment is so strongly pushing for – is approved. We are seeing how the Argentinian people are getting poorer and poorer so fast, while wealth continues to concentrate more and more in the hands of a few.”

Likewise Kouloglou commented that “it is impressive to see how the politics of the Macri government, that have worsened so quickly and so dramatically the situation of the Argentinian people, are so similar to what the Greek rightist opposition is proposing for my country. They will probably bring back to Greece what my country finally succeded to get rid of, after suffering so much”.