 Λοιπόν, Βερλίν, Λόνδον, Βαρσελόνα, Why does Yanis Varoufakis tell us so much, what's the political purpose of this trip? Μετά την Αθήν Σπραγματική Ριβέλιον against the Troika of Lentes was crashed in July 2015. Και number of us decided that it was essential, to take that spirit of what we tried to do in Athens, which is to reboot the European Union, to recreate the circumstances of shared hope by taking this campaign to the rest of Europe. Αυτό θα είναι ένα εγώ και για το Υπουργικό Ευρώπιο. Για πολύ σύμπρος σημαντικότητα, αν δεν, και το Εκοφίνο, ο Ευρωκρόπιος Ευρωπαϊκός Ένωσης, το Ευρωπαϊκό Κέντρο, το Ευρωπαϊκό Κέντρο, να συμπροστάσουν τα ίδια πόλη. Η Ευρωπαϊκή Ένωση θα συμπροστάσουν. Θα υπάρχει και η συμπροστάσή. Αυτό που μπορεί να πιστεύουμε για το Ευρωπαϊκό Ένωση για όλες μας. Τελικά στον July θα είναι ένα χρόνο από την ελληνική Ευρώπη. Από αυτό, πιστεύαμε να συμπροστάσουμε για να συμπροστάσουμε την Ευρωπαϊκό Κέντρο. Πώς βλέπεις ότι στις τώρα, ένα χρόνο πριν, νομίζω ότι ήταν χρήματος, ή πώς βλέπεις. Δεν εμπροστάσαμε να συμπροστάσουμε την Ευρωπαϊκό Κέντρο. Εμπροστάσαμε, αυτό που είπα, από τη δευτερία του Αλέξης Τσίπρας. Από αυτό, η δευτερία που είπα was, γιατί στον τελευταίο της δευτερίας, όταν οι γραμμές, οδηγιότητας γραμμές, έδωσε στις 62% του Μαμβιουτου να πω, δεν στον Τραγκά, ο Παραμμινιστής έκανε να πω, ναι, αυτό είναι η δευτερία που είπα, γιατί δεν μπορούσα να πω με αυτό. Επίσης, εγώ ειδικά, η δευτερία μου και η δευτερία της μόνος μας, που είχα πει, ναι, was a judgement that, by saying yes to the trigger, we were perpetuating the crisis, deepening it and making Greece less and less sustainable. What role do you think Spain can play after the elections in June, for the change in Europe? Oh, I think that the Spanish people, on the 26th of June has an opportunity to put a government in place that saves Europe. This is what we should focus our mind on. This is not what can we do for Spain and how much money can we take from Europe or what kind of concessions can we exact from Brussels and from the European Central Bank. This is bigger than that. It's all about saving Europe. And Spain is a substantial country. It's a significant economy. It's much greater than Greece. And therefore it has the weight, which is necessary in order to impose upon Brussels and Frankfurt and Berlin a different mentality, to put it differently. Mariano Rajoy, as well as Matteo Renzi, used the weight of Spain and of Italy in order to be allowed to break the rules. This is not going to change Europe. It is not helping Spain, Italy or Europe. We need new rules. We need to re-discuss and re-design together as Europeans the way we are doing things in Europe. And this is where the new Spanish Prime Minister, whoever he might be, has an opportunity and it must not be missed. If we suppose, for instance, that it would be Podemos and now it is Kierdaunida, do you think they have a real plan against austerity, a plan that maybe Syriza did not have or did not implement because of the Troika at that moment? Well, it's not a question of having a plan against austerity. We have a plan against austerity. We had one in Greece. Podemos has a plan against austerity in Spain. You know, actually it's very simple. You just stop doing austerity. It's not rocket science. You just stop cutting, hoping that by cutting you're going to create something. Butchery has never created anything. So it's not that. The question is, do we have a plan for answering, opposing and annulling the threats that will come from the center, from Brussels and from Frankfurt? That is the key question. And is there an intention to confront rather than to be co-opted? And do we have this possibility to fight? Oh, absolutely. We have the possibility, but we have very strong tools for doing that. But what we need to acquire is, firstly, a very detailed plan on what to do. Secondly, we need to announce this in advance. We must reject any attempt by the Troika to co-opt the new government into its program even before it gets sworn into government. And we have to publicize this in advance so that the European Central Bank, Mr. Deiserblum, Mr. Schorble, know what the intentions of the incoming administration are. If Podemos have this plan right now... It is not for me to interfere in Spanish politics or in the affairs of Podemos or any party. I truly believe in the sovereignty of our nations and of our political parties. The democracy in Europe movement is not trying to usurp the role of political parties who are not antagonistic with Podemos or any party for that matter. What we are doing by going from one country to another, by being here, by having our own DM members here working, is to create a European agenda within which progressives and progressive parties and progressive governments can operate in a manner which is good for the Spanish people, as well as for the European Union, as well as for Europe as a whole. Do you think that the left in Spain has softened the speech since kind of appeared this movement, like with Podemos, I mean? There's nothing wrong with soft spoken words. We must not allow ourselves to mistake revolutionary words for revolutionary actions. We must bring about the change that the Spanish people need and that Europe needs. We must engage in soft spoken diplomacy. We must compromise. There's no doubt that one needs to compromise. Compromise is not bad if you're trying to come to an agreement with the other side. But we must, at the very same time, be steadfast about the important principles. For instance, that we should not simply accept the rules as they are, that there should be no commitment to the previous policies that the Rajoy government has been following. There's no doubt that the European Central Bank and the Eurogroup will try to impose upon the new government the policies of the previous government. That is where we must not be soft. We must be very hard on this and soft on everything else. Choking about cities now, today you will be present at an event with the mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau and some other colleagues. A few days ago it was a year, it was the anniversary of the election as a mayor. From the municipal government, Colau and her colleagues, they have found themselves with certain limits of power because of lobbies and other kind of barriers. So it shows that even if you have the best intentions, there are always some limits to your power. So how do you evaluate it? Taking the example of the change in Barcelona one year later, do you think that these limits exist and how can you fight them? As European progressives, we are all looking at what is happening in Barcelona, in the city of Barcelona, and we are all very proud of Ada Colau and her administration. Of course you are going to come up against limitations and constraints. We don't live in the ideal world that we would like to live in, but what Ada Colau has done in Barcelona is a miracle. A movement that began as a protest movement against foreclosures, against the vagaries of neoliberalism at the level of the city, has entered the city hall and transformed it. Within the constraints that they are facing, our comrades in the city of Barcelona have transformed the way that the city is being run, the budget is being compiled. The city of Barcelona is now producing innovations regarding financing of cooperatives, financing of businesses, innovations in how to do that which progressives always wanted, to enter the institutions, to be in the institutions and at the same time being against the establishment. This is what we need to do at the level of the city, at the level of the regional government, at the level of the nation-state government, as well as at the level of the European Union institutions. So when people say to me, but the European Union is a terrible institution, why are you saying that we should try to democratize it? Well, the city of Barcelona used to be a terrible institution. All our states were oligarchic feudal. We didn't turn against them. We entered through political action and through mobilization, those institutions, and tried to change them from within. And this is what's happening magnificently here in the city of Barcelona. Do you think that Barcelona itself as a city can lead the change in Europe amongst other cities? It's already doing it. Every city council I know, from Leeds where I was two days ago, in the north of England, to Greece, to everywhere in Europe, is looking at what's going on in Barcelona, getting ideas and trying to imagine ways in which the experience of Barcelona can be transformed into local experiences. About Ada Colau, how do you perceive she's seen from Europe, from other institutions, maybe like European institutions, and also in the Guardian some days ago, there was an article asking, wondering, if she was the most radical mayor in Europe. Do you agree with that? How do you think she's seen in Europe? Well, I'm not sure whether she's the most radical mayor in Europe, and I don't actually know what that would mean, but she's the most radical mayor who's actually changing her city radically and changing the perspective that Europeans have about what their cities are capable of doing. So there's no doubt that Ada Colau is a major figure in European politics. And I would not mind it too much if the bureaucrats, the grey bureaucrats in Brussels, disliked her. That would have been actually a medal of honour for Ada Colau. Now talking about Catalonia, we need to ask about it. It's happening something here. So I'm sure you're aware of the process that Catalonia is trying to get independence. How do you see it? Well, I believe in self-determination. Strongly believe in self-determination. The people of Catalonia have the right and a historic duty to themselves to make up their own minds on what they want Catalonia to be part of and what they wanted to be integrated within Spain, within the European Union. The people of Catalonia deserve their right to a process which will help them determine their future and their constitutional arrangements. What is interesting is that in the European Union at the moment we have a disintegrating centre. The European Union is in trouble, is in serious crisis. But that is also an opportunity because it gives us an opportunity to think of the kind of constitution we should want for the European Union to replace those awful treaties that no one can actually read and understand. They were written in order not to be understood and in order to be despised by everyone who tries to read them. So we need a constitutional process for the European Union and that opens up space for the people of Britain to rethink their own constitution, the relations between England and Scotland for instance, with Wales, with Northern Ireland, Similarly here the relations between Catalonia and Madrid. In Belgium and so on. It's a great opportunity. We should see it as an opportunity, not as a threat, to reconfigure a European Union constitutional process within which we embed constitutional processes towards self-determination and towards a more harmonious coexistence of different peoples on the Iberian Peninsula and everywhere else. And just one more question about the cities. You are talking about the constitutional process. Do you think what role can play the rebel cities in a change at the European level? No one can wake up in the morning and be mobilized to change Europe. Some of us may, but we are a tiny minority. What people wake up in the morning and dream of is changing their neighborhood, their city, their region, maybe their country. But at the same time they understand that all these efforts have to be embedded within a European agenda. Because Europe is creating the ecology within which we all have, our communities must survive and evolve. So the idea of a radical intervention in your neighborhood, in your city, which is then linked to other cities, the rebel cities network, under the umbrella of a European agenda, which we, for instance, at the Democracy in Europe movement, DM25, we are trying to create, these are all the parts of the whole that can inspire us and give us hope. What will you say to those that might consider your plan B, your movement idealistic? Well firstly let me tell you that when I was in government I had the plan B and I had the plan C and actually I had the plan X. But that's not what Europe needs. We don't need a plan B in Europe. We need a plan A. Because Europe is drifting, anchor-less, without a plan A. And DM is trying to create a plan A. This is a European agenda. Is it idealistic? Definitely. But then again the world became a better place because there were idealists who at some point for instance in the 19th century decided against all evidence that it would work to form an anti-slavery movement. The idea that there could be a society without slaves was unheard of before then. The idea that we would have a national health service. The idea that we would have social security. These were utopian ideas. But without them the world would have been a far worse place. And what I answered to those who say that our DM movement is utopian is yes it is. But the only alternative is a horrible dystopia. After your experience from the inside of European institutions it is only possible to change things from the outside? No. We have to change things everywhere. And we must not imagine that these institutions just because they are awful can be neglected and ignored. The slogan that I would like to share with you and with our audience is we must be in and against every institution. We must enter institutions we must enter government, parliament, the city hall, the European Parliament, the European Commission in order to change it. But after all this is how history happens. Through thesis and antithesis. Through clashes. Through confrontation. You defend transforming the European Union without breaking it up. Is there the idea of breaking instead of reforming a Europe that does not respect its own treaties and laws gaining more and more support, power? So that when you have a deep crisis like we do there are centrifugal forces that are tearing apart. And there are those from the right, the racist right, the xenophobic, ultra-nationalist right that want to build borders and fences and go back to the nation, the patriarchal, misogynistic racist past. And there are also forces from the left, the comrades of mine from the left, who say the European Union is a new liberal project, let it die and it will create something better. I disagree with both. Because even though I'm much closer with my left-wing comrades my disagreement with them is that the disintegration of this terrible European Union we have is only going to favor the former, the racists, the ultra-nationalists. It will not create circumstances but it will bring progressives in power within nation-states that have been created or recreated after the dissolution of the European Union. This is why we need to stabilize the European Union to confront it. You see, I'm not a reformist. I believe in radical change. But to bring about radical change to the European Union we don't need to dismantle it. We need to enter it and we need to force it to become civilized. We need to change the situation, not reform. It will be reformed in the end but through confrontation first. You are critical with the European Union, like we see, but at the same time you are campaigning against the Brexit. It may be difficult to understand this. It sounds a bit contradictory. Life is contradictory and that's why we must be with our fellow Europeans that we need to be sophisticated in the way we look at life. There are no black and white solutions. What I say in Britain when I appear in various venues, which I do because I'm campaigning actively against Brexit, is this. No one can accuse me of being a sympathizer of Brussels, of being a lucky or Mr. Junker or Mrs. Merkel. So I'm not coming to you here with a narrative of how wonderful the European Union is. The European Union is pretty terrible. But firstly if you vote to leave on the 23rd of June you're not going to leave because you're part of the single market. The single market forces you to accept rules and regulations but almost everything. Industrial standards, environmental protection standards, market regulation who has the right to change to do the plumbing in your bathroom from Brussels. So even if you leave, Brussels will be writing those rules unless you get out of the single market but getting out of the single market will take decades. So what are you going to gain by voting to get out? You're not going to gain your independence Secondly, by getting out of the European Union you will accelerate the destruction of this terrible European Union. And what will happen if you accelerate this destruction, this disintegration of the European Union what will happen is we can have a major deflationary depression like economic shock in Europe with major conflict between let's say France and Germany between the east and the west between the north and the south of the continent that is going to create circumstances that will in a sense pull the carpet from under the feet of the British economy. So even if you are out you are not going to be shielded isolated, insulated from the terrible developments in Europe. So you do not gain anything in terms of your democracy and autonomy by getting out but when you stay here with us and we confront Brussels together that's my message. To democratize Europe it's the that's the DM wanted in 10 years isn't too much time taking into account the urgency of the immigration crisis and social crisis economic crisis but don't you think that a European Union it's going to crash before Don't confuse the maximum with the minimum the 25 in DM 25 is the maximum this is what we have at most until 2025 to fix maybe next year there will be no European Union the way the European Union is behaving it's actually undermining itself so we don't have much time the 25 in DM 25 so we are being optimistic maybe we have 10 years to save it maybe we don't, maybe we have less we will try as DM 25 to do whatever we can to speed up the process of democratization because time is of the essence until when we will see Cyprus exchanging migrants with Turkey what do you think what's your opinion on how the Greek government and the authorities are dealing with migrants as Europeans we must be deeply ashamed of the European Union treaty with Turkey this is not a Cyprus treaty with Turkey this is broken by Chancellor Merkel, by Hollande, Rahoi by all of them together unfortunately Alexis Cyprus signed it, he should not have signed it but it's not his treaty it's a European Union treaty and it is a scandal it will remain in Europe's history as an awful black chapter why? because effectively what we are doing come to think of it is we are bribing an autocratic president of Turkey somebody was turning against his own people against newspapers against minorities against even his own prime minister whom he dismissed we are this autocratic president is being bribed by the European Union to the tune of 6 billion euros to do what? to allow the European Union to violate international law on refugees and effectively to bundle them up and send them back to Turkey from lesbos and so on this treaty this agreement with Turkey firstly can't work already you can see that it's not working and secondly it shouldn't work because if we manage to succeed in sending these people back to Turkey as part of this treaty we can't do anything against humanity so the sooner we annul this agreement the better and the last one how will you define the moment we are living which historical moment is Europe is living now is it a defeat a window of opportunity maybe hope all that bundled together Arthur Miller once said that you know that an era has ended when its illusions become exhausted the illusions of the neoliberal European Union of the Troika of the European Central Bank and so on those illusions that have sustained it for so many years have now become exhausted nobody believes in them anymore not even those who run those institutions but the tragedy is and the hope that the new have not been born yet and it is struggling to be born and during that struggle you have simultaneously fear and hope and we should work towards investing in hope I would like to ask another question maybe more personal but obviously your speech is very optimistic which is good because what we need in Europe now but have you ever feel disappointed or exhausted being that optimistic when the Europe we see it's I don't know how to describe it but it's not getting better let's say every day every day every moment one struggles with disappointment the question is how do you deal with disappointment how do you respond to it how do you react to it do you react to it with paralysis or with action springs naturally from the actual action itself ok so thank you so much thank you very much