Europe must save Greece to save itself | Timothy Garton Ash

Even if you don’t care about the Greek people, be warned – the faultlines of Grexit would shake the entire continent

Europe must save Greece. The consequences of keeping Greece within the eurozone will be bad, but those of its leaving would be worse. They would be not just economic, but human, geopolitical and historic. Europe would never be the same again.

I was in Greece two weeks ago, and grasped this at every turn, from standing on the ancient Pnyx, the birthplace of democracy, through talking to business leaders, journalists and academics, many of who were witheringly critical of the current Syriza government. But since then I have been back in northern Europe, in England, Belgium and now Poland, and in the north I find not just relative indifference (Greece is more often the subject of jokes than of deep concern) but also two dangerous illusions.

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