Tsipras Says ’Fiscal Waterboarding’ Holding Greece Back

Anti-austerity leader Alexis Tsipras said Greece can’t repay its debt as long as its creditors enforce “fiscal waterboarding” and signaled he’ll boost government spending if his Syriza alliance wins power.

In an op-ed article in Germany’s Handelsblatt newspaper today, Tsipras said the notion that Greece’s economy has stabilized is an “arbitrary distortion of the facts.” He said that while the economy grew 0.7 percent in the third quarter, the recession isn’t over because inflation was a negative 1.8 percent.