Threatening to leave the eurozone may be Ireland’s only way to break the link between its sovereign and bank debt

Ireland faces a heavy fiscal and structural adjustment programme imposed by the Troika at the same time as some EU countries insist that it continues to pay the debt of its failed banks. With Spain now getting assistance for its banks under the European Stability Mechanism, Aidan Regan argues that there are different rules for different eurozone countries. He writes that the only way that Ireland may be able to achieve its objective of separating sovereign from bank debt is to threaten to leave the monetary union.