Greece in trouble: What will Turkey’s role be?

The Greek economic crisis looks like an unending story. The country has received almost $296 billion in rescue funds since 2010. Its external debt has received a sizeable haircut, meaning that it has not honored its debts. That created momentary relief for Greek finances, but still its long-term effects have been dreadful. For the coming 15 years, nobody will seriously consider buying Greek bonds, which has created de facto control of Greece by the European Central Bank. Moreover, the economy of Greek Cyprus has gone bankrupt because of its exaggerated portfolio of Greek bonds in their banking system.

Greek Cyprus's bankruptcy of the banking system has also rendered public the relations between Cypriot banks and Russia. It became obvious that Greek Cyprus was politically and financially closer to President Vladimir Putin's Russia than to Brussels. This was not to the liking of Greece, which had to deal with a Cypriot problem that became more complicated and more difficult to support. On the other hand, the very severe austerity policy has created immense turmoil in Greece. It was obvious that the Greek economy would not be able to pay back such an immense loan, so the bailing out process was designed to last years while waiting for the economy to recover.

In addition, the Greek economy could not rapidly deliver positive achievements, but the system put in place to monitor the process rendered the whole operation extremely unappealing for the average citizen. Three institutions, all faceless, have been nominated as the "Troika" to monitor the Greek economic recovery program - the European Commission, European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Since 2010, these three institutions are closely surveying the economic reforms in Greece that never really took place.

Recently, some relatively good results have been heralded by Prime Minister Antonis Samaras of Greece as "the end of the tunnel" that could allow Greece to alleviate the severe austerity conditions imposed on it. Samaras needed such "good news" in order to contain mounting popular discontent. The political alternative of Samaras's coalition of center-right and center-left parties is the fascist Golden Dawn and the rising Coalition of the Radical Left (Syriza), under the leadership of a charismatic young politician with no experience, Alexis Tsipras. Syriza has a very populist rhetoric with no real economic program, promising the population free electricity and heating for the approaching winter, and remains the nightmare of all European and international institutions.

Samaras's idea and hope to end the austerity program earlier than expected has backfired. He thus decided to organize early presidential elections. The presidential office has only a symbolic meaning, but the elections are seen as a litmus test for the government. On the other hand, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu carried out a well-covered visit to Athens to revive the ailing relations between Greece and Turkey. Basically, Turkey with its steady economic growth and stability remains the "big" answer to Greece's problems in the medium run. Will the Greek government be able to implement a real opening policy toward Turkey, while Turkish-Greek Cypriot relations remain at an all-time low? How does the Greek opposition envisage its relations with Turkey? There are too many unanswered questions, but Ankara remains open to increased and institutional collaboration and integration. In this sense, it could prove to be a historic turning point in versatile Turkish-Greek relations in decades.