The euro summit and the empty beaches

Empty cafes and restaurants, hotels with no bookings - the Greek tourist industry has been badly hit by the financial crisis.

Greece is the main topic of a meeting of European leaders in Brussels on Wednesday. The European summit follows the G8 talks in the United States, where new French president François Hollande called for another issue of eurobonds by the European Central Bank.

This will enable countries which have difficulty borrowing on the financial markets to access funds more cheaply. However, it will also mean that countries like Germany and the Netherlands will have to pay higher interest rates. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is against issuing eurobonds and, perhaps unsurprisingly, the Greek and Italian governments are in favour. (continues)
Greece certainly looks like getting fewer Dutch tourists this year. Current affairs programme Nieuwsuur investigated the Greek island of Aegina and discovered more than 13 percent fewer holidays had been booked.

Until recently, Aegina had a flourishing tourist industry. Now many hotels, restaurants and bars are in dire straits. One hotel owner interviewed by Nieuwsuur was fully booked last year but only has 14 bookings so far for the coming season. Other hotels will also be largely empty this summer.

Greek holiday bookings from France are down 17.5 percent. Italian and Spanish bookings are down 5 and 0.5 percent respectively. On the other hand, there is some good news. Bookings from Turkey - still a non-EU country - are up 3.4 percent.
(imm)