BRUSSELS — European leaders, angered after Greece’s new finance minister showed up for an emergency meeting in Brussels without a new proposal to resolve the nation’s huge debt crisis, late Tuesday gave the Athens government until Sunday to reach an agreement to save its battered economy from a meltdown.
布鲁塞尔——周二,希腊新财长在布鲁塞尔召开的紧急会议露面上,却没有提交解决该国巨额债务危机的新提案,激怒了欧洲领导人。周二晚间,欧洲领导人要求希腊政府在周日之前达成协议,挽救其遭受重创的经济,避免发生崩溃。
“I have no doubt that this is the most critical moment in our history,” Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council, the body that hosts summit gatherings, told reporters after yet another round of fruitless meetings in Brussels.
“我毫不怀疑,这是我们历史上最关键的时刻,”欧洲理事会(European Council)主席唐纳德·图斯克(Donald Tusk)在又一轮无果而终的会议之后,在布鲁塞尔对记者说。欧洲理事会是主办峰会的机构。
“The situation is really critical and unfortunately we can’t exclude the black scenarios of no agreement,” he said, warning that these included “the bankruptcy of Greece and the insolvency of its banking system” and great pain for the Greek people. Also looming ever larger was the prospect of Greece leaving the European currency union.
“形势真的很紧迫,不幸的是,我们不能排除达不成任何协议的最糟情况,”他警告说,这些情况包括“希腊破产,该国银行体系无力偿债”,希腊人民承受极大的痛苦。希腊退出欧洲货币联盟的可能性也日益增加。
He said all 28 European Union leaders would gather at the meeting on Sunday for what he described as a final chance to resolve a Greek crisis that began more than five years ago and, after a period of calm following huge bailout deals, resumed with new intensity in January following the victory of Syriza, a left-wing party, in Greek parliamentary elections.
他表示,周日的会议将是解决希腊危机的最后一次机会,欧盟28国领导人将全部出席。希腊危机已经持续超过五年,在达成巨额救援协议之后,经过了一段平静时期。但自从今年1月激进左翼联盟(Syriza)在希腊议会选举中获胜之后,危机又再次加剧。
Deadlines have repeatedly slipped in the past but European Union leaders on Tuesday scheduled an emergency gathering for Sunday that might really be a crunch point. “This could be the last meeting about Greece,” Prime Minister Matteo Renzi of Italy told reporters on Tuesday night.
过去,最后期限被一再打破。但本周二,欧盟领导人安排在周日召开一个紧急会议,届时可能真的会成为最后关口。 “那可能是关于希腊的最后一次会议,”意大利总理马泰奥·伦齐(Matteo Renzi)周二夜里告诉记者。
Tuesday’s effort to break the deadlock got off to an inauspicious start when Greece’s new finance minister, Euclid Tsakalotos, on his second day in the job, failed to present a detailed plan at a meeting of finance ministers called to review Syriza’s demands after Greek voters rejected previous terms on offer from Europe in a referendum on Sunday.
打破僵局的行动本周二出师不利,希腊新财长欧几里德·察卡洛托斯(Euclid Tsakalotos)未能在财长会议上提交一份详细的计划,这是他上任的第二天。希腊选民在上周日的全民公投中否决了欧洲之前的提议之后,欧洲安排了此次会议,来审议激进左翼联盟的要求。
The failure to present concrete proposals on Tuesday turned what had been billed as a last-chance opportunity for Greece into another display of the substantive and stylistic gulf between the government of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and his country’s big creditors, starting with Germany and other European countries that use the euro.
周二拿出具体方案被宣扬为希腊最后的机会,但这一点未能达成。这一情节再一次突显出,希腊总理亚历克西斯·齐普拉斯(Alexis Tsipras)领导的政府,与该国最大的债权人德国及其他欧元区国家之间,存在行事风格的差异和实质性的分歧。
Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, speaking after an inconclusive meeting attended by Mr. Tsipras and leaders of 17 other countries that use the euro, made it clear that eurozone leaders were determined to set a very high bar for Athens before the Thursday deadline.
齐普拉斯和其他17个欧元区国家的领导人出席的一场会议无果而终。德国总理安格拉·默克尔(Angela Merkel)在会后明确表示,欧元区领导人决心要在周四的最后期限之前,给希腊提出很高的要求。
“There are only a few days left for a discussion on what’s going to happen in the future,” she said. But if a Greek offer made by Thursday won a preliminary green light, that would “pave the way for negotiations,” she added.
默克尔说,“离讨论将来怎么办只剩几天时间了。”她接着表示,但如果希腊在周四之前提出的方案初步获得通过,那就会“为谈判铺平道路”。
Still, it appears that no one wants to take the blame for a Greek departure from the eurozone. That means that all sides seem ready to keep talking even as the crisis reaches new levels of intensity, and even as Greece hurtles toward a July 20 deadline to make a payment of 3.5 billion euros, or about $3.8 billion, to the European Central Bank. Many analysts say Greece cannot miss that payment without leaving the eurozone.
然而,似乎谁都不想承担希腊退出欧元区的责任。这就意味着,各方似乎都准备继续谈判,尽管此次危机的程度日益加深,而且希腊向欧洲中央银行(European Central Bank)支付35亿欧元的最后期限7月20日即将到来。很多分析人士称,如果希腊无法拿出这笔钱,就不得不退出欧元区。