Every leader wants to put his or her imprint on the work that they do, and grow up in specific eras.

How can a parliamentarian or a leader in a country say, on the one hand, that we're going to support Greece but at the same time say that Greeks are lazy?

If Greece had gone through a very normal political life, I may have not been in politics. But just the fact that I lived through huge upheavals and very difficult struggles and polarization and the barbarism of dictatorships - that made me feel that we had to change this country.

There are certain moments in the history of a nation when the choices made define the decades to come.

Greece has given Europe the opportunity to fix a defect in the euro zone, that is the fact that we did not have a fiscal union. Now steps have been taken to begin that process. And there is more solidarity from nation to nation, and that is a good thing. That has been Greece's gift to Europe.

The structures in Europe in a globalising economy need to be modernised, need to be more integrated, need to be stronger.

The real problem in Greece is not cutting taxes, it's making sure that we don't have tax evasion.