As many of you will know, one of the most influential TV programmes here in Iceland is Silfur Egils, presented by host Egill Helgason [who also happens to be one Iceland's most popular - and influential - bloggers] and broadcast live on Sundays at 12.30 pm.
Egill Helgason was the man instrumental in inviting Eva Joly – one of the world’s top corruption hunters – to Iceland to be a guest on his programme early last year, and then asked her point blank if she could “help us” with the investigation into the bank collapse. A few days later, the Icelandic authorities recruited her to act as advisor in the investigation.
Since then, Mme Joly has been a great champion of Iceland, and one gets the feeling that this concern is born out of a deep personal conviction, rather than self-serving interest.
Today she was once again a guest on Silfur Egils, and was joined [live, via Satellite from Paris] by Alain Lipietz who, like Mme Joly, is a member of the European Parliament. Lipietz participated in writing the EU directive on depositors’ insurance funds, and the two of them had some highly interesting things to say about Iceland’s current situation concerning the repayment of the Icesave debt. In his view, the legal arguments of the British and Dutch authorities would not hold up in an EU court.
The interview is available on Lára Hanna’s blog – she is already a national treasure for her invaluable work in retaining and publishing [at her discretion] all sorts of information relating to the bank collapse. Among other things she records TV interviews – many of which are not available anywhere else – and publishes them on her blog.
The videos she has up today are all from the latest Silfur Egils, and four of them are in English. First is the interview with Eva Joly and Alain Lipietz, after which there is an interview in Icelandic with MP Ögmundur Jónasson and after that economics professor Michael Hudson in the US [in English]. A little further down on the page there is an interview with Elvira Méndez Pinedo, an associate professor in European law at the University of Iceland, and finally an interview with Gerard van Vliet, advocate for a depositors’ group in Holland. All of them are well worth watching for anyone interested in this subject.
