Yanis Varoufakis, Greece's former finance minister, has warned that the beleaguered country is set to become "a vassal state of the Eurogroup" and warned that far-Right groups in the country will inevitably thrive from the EU-imposed austerity.
Varoufakis, a self-described "erratic Marxist", was perpetually at odds with other EU finance ministers during his time in office because of his refusal to accept further austerity. He resigned from his post on the morning after Greece's referendum, which came out overwhelmingly against the new bailout proposal last week.
In his first televised interview since the Greek government caved in to lenders' demands and agreed to impose more austerity, Varoufakis claimed that Greece's radical, neo-fascist Golden Dawn party will gather more support in the light of the bailout deal.
"In parliament I have to sit looking at the right-hand-side of the auditorium, where 10 Nazis sit, representing Golden Dawn," Varoufakis told ABC Australia, referring to the Golden Dawn MPs who were elected to parliament in January's elections.
"If our party, Syriza, has cultivated so much hope in Greece... if we betray this hope and bow our heads to this new form of postmodern occupation, then I cannot see any other possible outcome than the further strengthening of Golden Dawn. They will inherit the mantle of the anti-austerity drive, tragically."
The former finance minister also claimed the democratic project in Europe had "suffered a major catastrophe" with the bailout agreement and compared the situation in Greece today to the military coup of 1967, which resulted in a government of generals.
"The recent euro summit is indeed nothing short of the culmination of a coup," Varoufakis said. "In 1967 it was the tanks that foreign powers used to end Greek democracy. In my interview with Philip Adams, on ABC Radio National's LNL, I claimed that in 2015 another coup was staged by foreign powers using, instead of tanks, Greece's banks."
After the interview Varoufakis also issued a harshly worded statement, comparing the current bailout deal to the Treaty of Versailles, which saw allies impose reparations on Germany after Second World War.
"If that allegory was pertinent [in 2010] it is, sadly, all too germane now," Varoufakis writes.
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Lucy is the deputy news editor for Newsweek Europe. Twitter: @DraperLucy
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