The president of SYRIZA Alexis Tsipras met the President of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi, yesterday afternoon in Frankfurt. What mattered most was those that he did not say to the head of ECB rather those that they discussed.

Mr Tsipras expressed to Mr Draghi the already known view of SYRIZA for writing-off some of the Greek debt, as a prerequisite for a sustainable solution to the prolonged and devastating crisis.

Mr Tsipras avoided, though, to raise issues that might irritate Mr Draghi, such as the appointment of the new director of the Bank of Greece. SYRIZA has strongly opposed to the nomination of Yannis Stournara for governor and had asked the government to discuss this issue with them, the main opposition party. But the government did not take into account SYRIZA’s demand. Although the meeting took place during the time of the appointment and despite the fact that this is an issue that the ECB watches closely, Mr. Tsipras did not mention anything about it.

Perhaps because he had another goal: Tsipras wants to become an interlocutor of powerful European centres, without necessarily meaning that he will abandon his political views. It is significant that just a few days ago he was in Brussels to argue that the new president of the European Commission should be elected according to what had been agreed by all European partnerts and he even supported the election of Jean-Claude Juncker.

Mr Tsipras sends gradually the “signal” that he is a politician with deep pro-European direction, who wants a solution to the Greek problem within Europe and not outside it. Thus, he reassures the European lobby.

As for Mr. Draghi, SYRIZA is particularly interested in him. The party leadership believes that the central banker may be proved to be a stabilizing and deterrent factor in case German tries to blackmail Greece if Mr Tsipras becomes Prime Minister and refuse to implement the extreme policies of the Memorandum.