FRANKFURT: Greece's Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis said German Chancellor Angela Merkel must make a clear decision at a euro zone summit Monday on whether to negotiate a rescue deal with Athens or heed populist calls to jettison the debt-wracked country.
Merkel can "enter into an honorable agreement with a government, which has rejected the 'rescue package' and is seeking a negotiated solution, or follow the calls from (those in) her government who want her to throw overboard the only Greek government which has been faithful to its principles and which is able to take the Greek people on the road to reform," said Varoufakis.
"The German chancellor has a clear decision to make on Monday," he wrote in an op-ed to be published Sunday in German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
"On our side, we will come with determination to Brussels to agree to further compromises as long as we are not asked to do what the previous governments have done: Accept new debt under conditions that offer little hope for Greece to repay its debts," he wrote.
Varoufakis did not specify what compromises Greece was willing to make.
Meanwhile, US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said in an interview released on Saturday, the Greek government must make tough fiscal decisions and quickly reach an agreement with international creditors and fellow members of the euro zone, or it risks devastating both the country's economy and people.
"I think we're at a moment now where the burden is on Greece to come back with a response that's the basis for reaching an agreement as quickly as possible," he said in an episode of CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS" program that will air on Sunday, according to a transcript.
"What we know is the best solution is for Greece to make some tough decisions and for this to be worked out," he said.
Greece needs to secure a cash-for-reforms deal in order to avoid defaulting on a 1.6 billion-euro International Monetary Fund loan at the end of June, but talks have stalled and the long-struggling country faces being drummed out of the euro zone if it fails.
The United States is turning up the heat on the Greek government to break the deadlock. Last Tuesday Lew called Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras to emphasize "the urgency of Greece making a serious move to reach a pragmatic compromise with its creditors," and on Wednesday the State Department sent the same message.
Depositors shaken by the rapid deterioration of negotiations have been rapidly pulling money out of Greek banks, raising the specter the government may soon impose capital controls.
"The risk of contagion obviously is different than it was in the past because Greek sovereign debt is no longer sitting on the balance sheets of financial institutions. It's mostly sitting in sovereign places," Lew told Zakaria.
But he cautioned that markets' reaction to a default, or to the country's withdrawal from the euro zone, cannot be foreseen, adding "I don't think anyone should want to find out."
"It's clear that within Greece, the consequence of a failure here would mean a terrible, terrible decline in their economic performance," he said. "It will hurt the Greek people. They will bear the first brunt of a failure here."
Varoufakis wants ‘clear decision’ from Merkel on rescue deal
Varoufakis wants ‘clear decision’ from Merkel on rescue deal
‘The future is renewables,’ Indian energy minister tells World Economic Forum
- ‘In India, I can very confidently say, affordability (of renewables) is better than fossil fuel energy,’ says Pralhad Venkatesh Joshi during panel discussion
- Renewables are an increasingly important part of the energy mix and the technology is evolving rapidly, another expert says at session titled ‘Unstoppable March of Renewables?’
BEIRUT: “The future is renewables,” India’s minister of new and renewable energy told the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday.
“In India, I can very confidently say, affordability (of renewables) is better than fossil fuel energy,” Pralhad Venkatesh Joshi said during a panel discussion titled “Unstoppable March of Renewables?”
The cost of solar power has has fallen steeply in recent years compared with fossil fuels, Joshi said, adding: “The unstoppable march of renewables is perfectly right, and the future is renewables.”
Indian authorities have launched a major initiative to install rooftop solar panels on 10 million homes, he said. As a result, people are not only saving money on their electricity bills, “they are also selling (electricity) and earning money.”
He said that this represents a “success story” in India in terms of affordability and “that is what we planned.”
He acknowledged that more work needs to be done to improve reliability and consistency of supplies, and plans were being made to address this, including improved storage.
The other panelists in the discussion, which was moderated by Godfrey Mutizwa, the chief editor of CNBC Africa, included Marco Arcelli, CEO of ACWA Power; Catherine MacGregor, CEO of electricity company ENGIE Group; and Pan Jian, co-chair of lithium-ion battery manufacturer Contemporary Amperex Technology.
Asked by the moderator whether she believes “renewables are unstoppable,” MacGregor said: “Yes. I think some of the numbers that we are now facing are just proof points in terms of their magnitude.
“In 2024, I think it was 600 gigawatts that were installed across the globe … in Europe, close to 50 percent of the energy was produced from renewables in 2024. That has tripled since 2004.”
Renewables are an increasingly important and prominent part of the energy mix, she added, and the technology is evolving rapidly.
“It’s not small projects; it’s the magnitude of projects that strikes me the most, the scale-up that we are able to deliver,” MacGregor said.
“We are just starting construction in the UAE, for example. In terms of solar size it’s 1.5 gigawatts, just pure solar technology. So when I see in the Middle East a round-the-clock project with just solar and battery, it’s coming within reach.
“The technology advance, the cost, the competitiveness, the size, the R&D, the technology behind it and the pace is very impressive, which makes me, indeed, really say (renewables) is real. It plays a key role in, obviously, the energy demand that we see growing in most of the countries.
“You know, we talk a lot about energy transition, but for a lot of regions now it is more about energy additions. And renewables are indeed the fastest to come to market, and also in terms of scale are really impressive.”
Mutizwa asked Pan: “Are we there yet, in terms of beginning to declare mission accomplished? Are renewables here to stay?”
“I think we are on the road but (its is) very promising,” Pan replied. There is “great potential for future growth,” he added, and “the technology is ready, despite the fact that there are still a lot of challenges to overcome … it is all engineering questions. And from our perspective, we have been putting in a lot of resources and we are confident all these engineering challenges will be tackled along the way.”
Responding to the same question, Arcelli said: “Yes, I think we are beyond there on power, but on other sectors we are way behind … I would argue today that the technology you install by default is renewables.
“Is it a universal truth nowadays that renewables are the cheapest?” asked Mutizwa.
“It’s the cheapest everywhere,” Arcelli said.
