[Yaida Hakim] Joining me now is Yanis Varoufakis, Greece's former Finance Minister and the author of "Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism." Thank you so much for joining us here on the program. [Yanis] Great pleasure. [Yaida Hakim] Let's talk about: campaigning has just begun in France at the moment. President Emanuel Macron has almost indicated that he's taken this risk because he wants to save France from itself. But do you think we'll find ourselves in a position where he's almost handed the country over to the far-Right? [Yanis] Yes, in a nutshell. He tried to do what Jacques Chirac had once done: to shrink the appeal of the Socialists by appointing or letting a Socialist Prime Minister take over, what Mitterrand had done before that, with Chirac, but of course, Le Pen and the ultra-national xenophobic Right are not of the same ilk. And I think that, you know, what Macron did has backfired. But allow me to make the point, because usually it is presented as a great fight, conflict to the death between the liberal Macron and the anti-liberal... [Yaida Hakim] But he's being audacious, taking a risk. [Yanis] He's always been... You can't deny that he's been courageous and so on. But, this idea that there's a huge clash between two different worlds is very prominent, and I can see why. They're hating one another, there's no doubt that Macron and Le Pen hate one another. But my view is that they are symbiotic. Macron would never be president if Le Pen was not strong and quite fascistic, and Le Pen would never be strong if somebody like Macron was not in government practicing socialism for the very few, for the ultra-rich, and austerity for the many. So the two, they may not like one another, but they've been playing this dance. And this dance now, is taking us unfortunately, to a postmodern version of the 1930s where the ultra-Right is essentially being handed over power by the center-Right. [Yaida Hakim] Would we find ourselves then in a situation where Emanuel Macron could come out of this as some kind of lame duck? [Yanis] I think it's already backfired. He is a lame duck. Everybody in France... Yes, he's a very smart man. He knows that it was his last card. He played it, it didn't work. And now, you can see that the center-Right has imploded. The Republicans have completely gone to ground. They've been divided and so on. They're being picked up by the National Front, the RN. There is a coalition of the Left which is going to do reasonably well, but it will essentially dissolve the day after the elections because there's no coherence amongst them. It's just a tactical pact. So, at the same time, you have Germany, which is, let's not forget, the steam engine of the economy of the European Union and the basic foundation of the European Union. So you have France going that way, and the business model of Germany is kaput, is now beyond repair. So if you put the two together, -because the EU is, after all, the Franco-German axis- we have a continent which is fading. And it's becoming geostrategically, politically, ethically... We saw what's going on with migrants being drowned intentionally, more or less, by the European Union policy in the Mediterranean. It's becoming a cross between irrelevant and toxic. [Yaida Hakim] But why, especially at a time where there is a feeling that perhaps the United States may step back and Europe may need to step up, especially when it comes to the situation in Ukraine? [Yanis] We elected the European Union, especially after the introduction of the euro, on a fallacy: that we can have a federal money, a joint common currency, but no federal political institutions. I think that the Brexiteers -even though I was against Brexit- the Brexiteers had a point, -especially Margaret Thatcher before the Brexiteers came to the fore- for saying: 'Look, you are creating a common central bank but no common treasury. What are you doing?' So this was a fair-weather construction which was doing really very well before the huge storm of 2008, the great financial crisis. After that, you have a process of fragmentation of the European Union. You have 15 years of no investment because if you practice universal austerity in all our little states around Europe and the Central Bank prints money which it gives to financiers, which then pass it on to corporations which do not invest but they buy back their own shares using public money and the stock exchange does magnificently well, but there's no investment. Why is it that Volkswagen, the German car industry, is never going to be competitive with BYD and the Chinese or Tesla? Because there's been no investment for all those years. [Yaida Hakim] Which then, as a result of COVID and then the war in Ukraine, we've seen major economic issues that people have felt. We keep talking about the cost of living being... Do you think that that is part of just the lack of investment that has taken place or the lack of kind of...? [Yanis] Indeed, indeed because the pandemic hit the United States very badly, but it's recovering. Why is it recovering? Because they did not practice the degrees of ridiculous austerity that we practice in the European Union. And because they, at some point, they decided there's going to be a proper green deal. In Europe, we announce big numbers, concepts like the Green Deal, but then if you look at the details, there's no money there. Instead, there are sordid, semi-corrupt deals like the Recovery Fund, if you remember, during the pandemic. So we never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity to turn the wealth of the continent -the wealth in terms of scientific prowess, in terms of culture, in terms of actual wealth- into investment into the future. So we are fading, we're fading as a continent. [Yaida Hakim] So what do you think are some of the predictions that you have in terms of the war in Ukraine? You know, should the West now be talking, and Europe be talking to Russia to resolve this issue? Is that something that you believe should happen? [Yanis] From day one, I came out and said Putin is a criminal, no doubt about that. But a never-ending war is not going to be good for Ukraine, and it's not going to be good for Europe. And the conflict should be frozen on day one with a kind of deal that would leave everybody slightly dissatisfied, but it's the only kind of deal that can... [Yaida Hakim] Putin's saying: 'Give me 20% of the territory.' [Yanis] Putin can say that, but you see, of course, when you are not even negotiating, you're going to make outrageous demands. But for me, a sensible approach would be for the President of the United States, the President of China, Zelenskyy and Putin to start, even through proximity talks, a negotiation for going back to where we were before Putin invaded in 2022 in February, in exchange for guarantees both for Ukraine and for Russia that there will be no expansion of NATO. There will be something that Putin can sell to his own cabal. [Yaida Hakim] and feel like he's achieved something out of this. [Yanis] This is what you need to do. Instead, you have President Biden scandalously and irresponsibly saying that Putin should be dragged to the courts and Putin is Hitler. Well, if you believe that Putin is Hitler, then do what you did with Hitler: invade. But you're not invading, you're simply supplying weapons to the Ukrainians. [Yaida Hakim] Do you think they should? [Yanis] No of course not! But what I'm saying is that it's preposterous to say that Putin is Hitler and saying: 'But we're not going to go in there and we're going to let the Ukrainians take Moscow,' which is, you know, a joke, right? [Yaida Hakim] We have about a minute left, and I know you've been very vocal about the situation in Gaza and the Middle East. We've had reports that today, we've been reporting from Lebanon that the situation is escalating. How do you think things will unravel there and what do you think should happen next? [Yanis] Well, to begin with, it's clear that we have in Netanyahu, a prime minister who wants to escalate war. He wants a never-ending war to stay out of jail and to remain Prime Minister of Israel. He's a clear and present danger for Israelis, and most Israelis understand that, but they don't know how to get rid of him. On the question of the genocide which is happening in Gaza, it's something that should keep us all awake at night. It really doesn't matter, whether it's Hamas' fault or Netanyahu's fault. There are children that, as we speak, are injured, they have no parents, they have no food, they have no water, and they live in unsurvivable, unsurvivable conditions. The first priority should be a United Nations led campaign to have an immediate ceasefire, look after the people who, especially the children, who are dying. And let's all agree on one thing. Before we talk about, one-state solution, two-state solution, three-state solutions - these are theoretical constructs at the moment. We have a duty to come out with one common principle: equal political rights for everyone, whether they're Jewish, Palestinian, Bedouin, Christian, Atheist, Muslim, whatever, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. Let's start from that - end apartheid. [Yaida Hakim] Yanis Varoufakis, really fascinating talking to you. Thank you so much. [Yanis] Well, thank you so much.