Their coats are not unlike those of the Gestapo

The Harald Schmidt show, that Yes, it's me was much excited, a such obscenity, and more on the ARD, a public channel! "Nearly a month after its release, the Greek district of Prenzlauer Berg in Berlin, Restorer has still not digested the show, host Harald Schmidt, the German David Letterman on February 25. Katrin Bauerfeind young, that is more inspired to debut on the Internet, is revisiting the Greek history with (very) large hooves, concluding his sketch by this unfortunate joke: "and if the Greeks do perform, then a constructive suggestion to EU: sell the Greece to the Turkey! A Summit of provocation, when we know a little history of the region and the complexity of the relations between Athens and Ankara. But certainly not an isolated skid.

The program in question is indeed released three days after the a unfortunate of the magazine "focus", but usually good. On the latter, the poor Venus de Milo, adorned Greek flag, suddenly found an arm and address finger to German taxpayers, next to a title for the less explicit "of cheaters in the family of the euro". The week following, on the eve of a visit by Greek Prime Minister to Berlin, the popular daily "bild", read daily by 11 million people, relays shamelessly the suggestion of two members of the majority: Athens should consider selling some of its uninhabited islands to get out of debt. The lighthouse of the Springer group journal title then: "Sell therefore your Islands, hayed Greeks!", summarizing his words of one of the shocks formulas which he has the secret: "you receive for the money, it retrieves Corfu.".

Provocations don't stay without answer, of course. A photomontage published by the Greek newspaper "eleftheros Typos", the goddess Victoria holding in his right hand a swastika at the top of the victory column in Berlin. With this title: "Ca just like that, the slander of the Germany". Even newspaper conservative reference, "Kathimerini", but warned against any "anti-German hysteria", published a cartoon on which the Greek Minister of finance, interviewed by "the EU inspectors", removes his shirt to UCMJ under the gaze meets the three inquisitors, who would shout "sehr gut!", ("very good", in German). Their coats are not unlike those of the Gestapo...

The question of war damages

Since then, tensions stays more within the media sphere. The President of the Greek Parliament, Filippos Petsalnikos, convenes the German Ambassador to tell him that some of the media in his country "exceeded all limits". The Mayor of Athens, Nikitas Kaklamanis, called to "protest against these shameful publications." Deputy Prime Minister, Theodoros Pangalos, asked firmly to the Germany, in an interview with the BBC, not to belittle the Greece, "which she has destroyed the economy during the Nazi era" and that "she stole gold from the Central Bank." It is the old question of the repairs to the second world war that recessional... The Germany settled in the Greece, in 1960, $ 115 million deutsche Mark, intended primarily to Jewish victims of Nazi crimes. Berlin considers the matter closed, but the current crisis revives the debate on new compensation.

In Germany, the large Greek community (370,000 people) it also reacts. Members in a sale of the Greek Islands, the President of the Berlin community responds: "the Germany also has debts of several billion euros, it might as well sell Bavaria to the Czech Republic. Also supports it on a still painful scar: the expulsion of the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia following the Benes decrees. The German historian Hagen Fleischer, who lives in Greece, the relations between the two countries "have reached one of their lowest points".

Observers are surprised by as much as the Greece and the Germany had before this crisis, excellent relations... Among the subjects of friction, there were certainly the refusal of Athens to take delivery of submarines built by ThyssenKrupp and deemed defective - an agreement was ultimately reached last week on this point - either for German justice's refusal to extradite a former Executive Officer of Siemens, involved in a wide corruption scandal. Not to mention the issue of war, who regularly returns to the table.

There is nothing which can, however, start strong links. Without trace back to the marriage of the Princess Theophano with the Holy Roman Empire German Emperor Otto II in 972, it may be recalled that after the wars of independence of the Greece against the Ottomans, many scientists, administrators, engineers and German lawyers have come to help the country to modernize, from the 1830s. Roger-Pol right reminded in these pages recently, "a tradition German secular, philosophical and literary celebration of the Greece" ("Les Echos" from March 10).

As indicates Alexandros Tokhi, of the Freie Universität of Berlin, "gréco-allemandes relations, after the second world war, were largely cooperative." The Germany is the main economic partner of the Greece. German companies are investing heavily in the Greek economy, in infrastructure projects or in the banking sector. A large part of the active population of the Greece emigrated to Germany. "In addition, the Germany has actively supported the movement against the junta and has contributed to the restoration of democracy in the country in 1974." It is estimated that approximately 1 million Greeks, or 10 of the population, have stayed in Germany, to form or to work and that some 40,000 Germans live in Greece.

Deep traces

Question if the current crisis and media slipping in recent weeks will leave deep trace is. Views. The Greeks who live outside Greece and Germany seem to take things more recoil. For this lawyer based in Brussels, "attacks against the Germany came from the populist fringe of the press, most Greeks are aware that they are responsible for their own problems." Some watch even coverage of the German media of a cynical eye, use it to accusing the previous Government of having provoked the current situation and tarnished the image of the country. They also know that they have benefited from billions of euros in structural funds of the EU, which the Germany is the first contributor. "And I understand the German Government, which defends its own interests, is in a few weeks of important regional elections". As the Greek working for a European institution, he thinks that "all return to normal in the long term." "Today, you see some Greeks adopt a nationalist attitude, with for example calls for a boycott of German goods, but once the shock has been overcome, they calmeront" ensures.

Athens, Jens Bastian, a German, researcher at the Foundation Hellenic European and foreign policy (Eliamep), married to a Greek, was relieved to see that "the Greeks have not surrendered to the temptation of generalization, that they did not said that all the Germans thought as some newspapers." But concedes, "many Greeks feel insulted." They were waiting for making more net distance of Chancellor Merkel to these excesses. "This will leave traces, a certain disillusionment".

For Antonio, a designer CAD in Berlin, who has dual German and Greek nationality is more serious. It has no words to describe the attitude of Angela Merkel. "In this crisis, all the countries of the EU, the Germany is our worst friend." But friends who betray you when you're in trouble, you do forgive them not. Relations between the two countries will be for years to recover. I thought that the general idea behind the EU it was solidarity and assistance it.

The President of the association of corporate germano-grecques (VDGG), former member of Parliament to the Bundestag (SPD) from 1980 to 2005, is also angry. Specializing in economic issues, Sigrid Skarpelis-Sperk claims the ban of the TOS allowing speculators to bet on a Greek default. It supports Christine Lagarde, who "is quite right when she criticizes the German exporter model." And it warns: "Behind the Greece, there is a broader topic." It is the stability of the entire region is at stake, in Albania, in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Bulgaria. The economic and social situation in Albania is heavily dependent on transfers from the Albanian workers in Greece. And the Greek crisis is only the tip part of the other crises that may arise and threaten the foundations of the European Union. "She remains confident. Because there is tourism, fortunately... After meeting with Angela Merkel, on 5 March in Berlin, Georges Papandreou urged the Germans to spend their holidays in the Greek Islands, history of (re) discover the hospitality of its people...