article: Greece has demanded more than £200billion in compensation from Germany for Nazi atrocities during the Second World War. The government yesterday unveiled its final calculation for the war reparations stemming from occupation by the Third Reich. The radical left Syriza party says Germany owes Greece nearly 279billion euros, or £204billion to compensate it for looting and war crimes. Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras raised the reparations issue when he met German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin last month . The German government says the issue was resolved legally years ago. The demand comes just days before Greece is obliged to pay 450million euros of its debt to the International Monetary Fund. Yanis Varoufakis, the Greek finance minister, has said the country ‘intends to meet all obligations to all its creditors, ad infinitum’. Greece suffered a brutal occupation at the hands Adolf Hitler’s forces in 1941. More than 40,000 people are believed to have starved to death in Athens alone. Yesterday a parliamentary committee established by Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras for the first time put an official number on the reparations claim. It includes the cost of a 10billion euro forced Nazi loan made by the Bank of Greece and the return of archaeological treasures. The revised figures amount to nearly 10 per cent of Germany's GDP. Mr Tsipras raised the reparations issue when he met German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin last month. He has called the reparations question a ‘moral and ethical’ issue for his country. The new figure was revealed yesterday by Greek deputy finance minister Dimitris Mardas. ‘According to our calculations, the debt linked to German reparations is 278.7bn euros,’ he told a parliamentary committee investigating responsibility for Greece's debt crisis. Mr Mardas said the reparations calculation had been made by Greece's state general accounting office. Berlin paid 115m deutschmarks to Athens in 1960 in compensation – a fraction of the Greek demand. Greece says this did not cover payments for damaged infrastructure, war crimes and the return of the forced loan. Yanis Varoufakis, the Greek finance minister, has said the country ‘intends to meet all obligations to all its creditors, ad infinitum’ Yesterday a parliamentary committee established by Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras for the first time put an official number on the reparations claim . Germany insists the reparations issue was settled in 1990 legally and politically before Germany reunified. Syriza politicians have frequently blamed Germany for the hardship suffered by Greeks under the tough bailout conditions imposed by international lenders. Ministers have floated the idea of seizing German assets in the country to compensate the families of victims of Nazi war crimes. A poll carried for Greek radio found more than 80 per cent of Greeks agreed with the pusuit of Nazi war debt claims. Yesterday Greek MPs also voted to establish a committee examining the circumstances of its 2010 bail-out by eurozone creditors and the IMF to the tune of 240billion euros. ‘After five years of parliamentary silence on the major issues that caused the bailout catastrophe, today we commence a procedure that will give answers to the questions concerning the Greek people,’ Mr Tsipras said. Finance minister Yanis Varoufakis has claimed the economy was unfairly lumbered with the liabilities that it is now struggling to pay off as its coffers run empty. He has claimed Europe dealt with his country's bankruptcy by ‘loading the largest loan in human history on the weakest of shoulders - the Greek taxpayer’.
highlights: Greek government has unveiled its final calculation for the war reparations .
  Radical left Syriza party says Germany owes Greece nearly 279billion euros .
  The German government claims the issue was resolved legally years ago .
  It comes days before Greece is obliged to pay off 450million euros of debt .
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