SIR,

How sadly unsurprising that former European Central Bank vice president Lucas Papademos has been named as Greece's new prime minister.

First the EU managed to force the Greek government to revoke their referendum on EU imposed austerity measures.

Now they have successfully engineered the withdrawal of the country's prime minister, despite the fact he survived a confidence vote in his own Parliament, and replaced him with one of their own.

The audacity of it is utterly incredulous, and all to save a common currency that is increasingly looking doomed to fail anyway.

The fact that his first job will be to ensure Greece gets its latest bail out as well as coercing the IMF to afford a new £111billion international rescue package demonstrates why they wanted somebody with loyalties to the inside. He will also be in charge of ensuring the austerity measures attached to receiving the financial aid will be applied.

What is startling is the fact that the EU have effectively seen off a Prime Minister and shipped in its own man to do as they dictate.

Mr Papademos has effectively been parachuted in to implement EU policy which sends a signal across the entire continent about the sort of democracy the EU employs in order to preserve their own interests.

As the architect of the Greek transition from the Drachma to the Euro it will be his focus of attention to make sure the country keeps the single currency, despite the collateral damage of austerity measures that have already proven hugely unpopular with the Greek public.

John Bufton

(Ukip MEP for Wales)