Liz Alderman
Liz Alderman is a New York Times business and finance correspondent who works from Paris. She was previously business editor of the International Herald Tribune, its Paris-based sister paper.
Updated: 2 November 2010
Successive austerity budgets have left hundreds of thousands of Greece’s unemployed without health cover, or even the means to pay for life saving medicine, a desperate situation which an underground network of doctors is seeking to alleviate. 
Since taking over part of the historic Greek port of Piraeus, Chinese company Cosco has seen cargo traffic double over the last year. The other Greek side of the port is looking on with scepticism about working conditions, but perhaps also envy, according to this New York Times report. 
Beijing is fast building a bridgehead in Europe by buying up government debt and key strategic assets on the cheap in countries like Greece, Ireland and Spain that have been enfeebled by the crisis. But its long-term ambitions are not just to make money — it wants more of a say in Brussels too.