After surviving one of the largest national debt crises that Europe had seen since before the second world war, it had seemed that Greece’s economy was once again on its feet. The country that last year came close to exiting the Eurozone has however once again approached this brink. In advance of tortuous bailout negotiations on the 9th of May during a Eurozone finance Ministers meeting, Prime Minister Tsipras has forced tough and controversial reform bills, worth of €5.4bn in budget savings, through Parliament with the backing of 153 (Syriza party) members of the 300 seat house. Tsipras convinced his party Syriza that the shrinking of Greece’s pension system would be crucial for preventing "the system collapsing in a few years".

In response to the new austerity measures, about 10.000 people took to the streets in Athens. Greek riot police had fired tear gas to disperse masked demonstrators outside parliament who threw Molotov cocktails in revolt against the reforms. While the Greek economy is as of yet still able to cope with the measures, its people are drastically angered and many pensioners argue to be unable to survive on a mere 300 euros a month.

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