6am today Greece looked like they were on the way out
The FT has an interesting article on the machinations of the weekend EU talk-a-thon
Greece was closest to the exit door at 6am this morning as Merkel and Tsipras hit the wall in negotiations over the privatisation fund.
As they both gave up and headed for the door Donald Tusk saved the day by stepping in and saying;
"Sorry, but there is no way you are leaving this room,"
Both Tsipras and Merkel were locked away to carry on negotiations in which they managed to reach a compromise
The meetings themselves were starting to blow up at various points with France's Sapin suggesting that everyone should;
"get it all out and tell one another the truth"
That led to an outpouring of frustrations from people like Stubb and Schaeuble ,which led to his row with Draghi where Schaeuble fumed to Draghi that "he was not an idiot"
Tsipras got more than both barrels from many with one source saying it that it was:
"Extremely hard, and violent even"
and another saying that;
"Tsipras was crucified in there, crucified"
Hollande also takes some recognition that he pushed Merkel and Tsipras into Tusk's office to continue negotiating and he sided with Tsipras that Germany's idea for the privatisation fund would have meant humiliation for Greece
All round it looks like everything finally came to a head and the picture the FT has painted is probably just a scratch on the surface
The work is far from over but it looks like a lot of the pressure building from the last few weeks has been released on both sides
The full article is here (maybe gated)
6am and on his way out of the Eurozone