This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

The Greek prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, has been invited to Berlin during a new low in Greco-German relations, after the Greek finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis, was forced to deny “giving the finger” to Germany in a two-year-old YouTube video.

The German leader, Angela Merkel, invited Tsipras for his first visit to Berlin since he came to power in January on an anti-austerity platform that has led to clashes with Greece’s creditors, including Germany.

This is soon after Varoufakis, appearing via videolink on Günther Jauch, one of Germany’s most-watched political discussion programmes on the state TV channel ARD, was shown a video of himself criticising the Greek government for accepting the European Union’s bailout conditions.

In the video, filmed at a conference in Zagreb in May 2013, the finance minister said in English: “Greece should simply announce that it is defaulting, just like Argentina did, within the euro in January 2010, and stick the finger to Germany” – at which point he appeared to raise his middle finger – “and say, ‘Well, you can now solve this problem by yourself’.”

Jauch then asked Varoufakis, who could be seen shaking his head in the background: “The middle finger for Germany, Mr Minister? The Germans pay the most and are criticised the most for it. How does that go together?”

Varoufakis claimed the video had been doctored, and that he had “never given the finger ever”. But Alessandro Del Prete, who uploaded the six-minute video from which the clip was taken, tweeted later on Sunday to deny that the video had been altered.

Alessandro Del Prete (@alexdelprete) @myrovolos No editing on my video. And if you watch it, he references the finger also for Argentina. @MarcusSchwarze pic.twitter.com/E77Nb7C4Qi

Adding to the tension, Belgium’s finance minister warned Greece on Monday that it was a dispensable eurozone member.

Johan van Overtveldt said the currency bloc had sufficient funds to cope with a Greek departure. “What we have now in place would certainly allow us to survive that,” Mr Van Overtveldt said. “Nobody talks too much about that very openly, but my feeling is [the concern] is quite present around the table.”

Tsipras and Merkel will meet this week at a European summit, with the Greek leader saying that he was hopeful of a deal that will secure a financial lifeline for the country.



“The issue will be dealt with at a political level by the end of the week, until the summit or, if need be, at the summit itself,” he said.

European officials had earlier sought to halt an escalating war of words between Athens and German officials following comments from Tsipras that Germany should pay war reparations.

“The situation is serious,” a European Commission spokesperson, Margaritis Schinas, said noting that Greece and its creditors had to show progress on a list of reforms agreed on 20 February.

The Greek state is facing a cash squeeze this month because it has not yet received the remaining funds from its €240bn (£171bn) bailout – brokered by the European Central Bank, the EU and the International Monetary Fund. The Tsipras-led government is still locked in discussions with its international creditors on a revised reform plan.



Despite the funding squeeze, Athens found more than €500m to make a debt payment to the IMF on Monday. However, it faces another debt deadline on Friday when it must pay over €300m to the IMF.

The video, and the debate over its authenticity, dominated headlines in Germany on Monday morning, with Bild, a mass-circulation daily, asking: “Did Varoufakis lie on Jauch?”

But there was also criticism of the way ARD presented Varoufakis’s speech to heighten antagonism between the two countries.

Columnist Stefan Niggemeier, founder of Bildblog, a media watchdog website, pointed out that the ARD had clipped out the audio when Varoufakis referred to January 2010, making it look as though Varoufakis was illustrating Greece’s current attitude.

In response, Andreas Cichowitz, the ARD editor responsible for the show, said on Twitter that it should have been made clear that Varoufakis was referring to 2010.

On Monday ARD released a statement saying it had found “no indication whatsoever of manipulation or forgery in the video shown during the live broadcast”.

Meanwhile, Varoufakis repeated his claim that the video had been doctored, telling Der Spiegel: “The video was faked, without any doubt.”

Varoufakis was also scoffed at by some of the German media for downplaying Greece’s predicament as “insignificant liquidity problems”.