Italy is Germany’s puppet regime: Opposition Leader

Italy’s opposition leader Beppe Grillo has accused the government of being a “puppet” controlled by Germany, associating the country’s woes to Berlin-inspired European Union austerity policies.

The Five Star Movement leader wrote in his blog on Tuesday that the ruling grand coalition was “a puppet regime representing the interests of foreign countries, rather than Italy’s.”

The satirist-turned-politician criticized Prime Minister Enrico Letta for failing to address the country’s economic crisis and “safeguarding the interests” of its “international creditors, starting from Germany.”

Grillo, whose party is backed by roughly a quarter of Italian voters, compared Letta to Vidkun Quisling, Norway’s wartime pro-Nazi leader.

Letta is “the new Italian Quisling, the Norwegian collaborator who was at the service of the Nazis during World War II,” Grillo said.

Italy is suffering its longest recession since the World War II with youth unemployment at an all time high of 40.1 percent.

The country started to experience recession after its economy contracted by 0.2 percent in the third quarter of 2011, and by 0.7 percent in the fourth quarter of the same year.

Over the past decade, Italy has been the slowest growing economy in the eurozone.

The long-drawn-out eurozone debt crisis, which began in Greece in late 2009 and later on reached Italy, Spain, France, Portugal, Britain, Ireland, and Cyprus is viewed as a threat not only to Europe but also to many of the world’s other developed economies.

The worsening debt crisis has forced EU governments to adopt harsh austerity measures and tough economic reforms, which have triggered massive demonstrations in many European countries.