I must admit, I was rather impressed at the speed with which Eurozone leaders tackled the Greek crisis during the summit in Brussels, but are there two more crises looming?

What was due to be a run of the mill European Council meeting last week turned into a baptism of fire for EU President Herman Van Rompuy. While he has been called a damp rag, he was always touted as a person who can bring bickering parties closer to agreement. Just how much of an effect he had on bringing Nic and Angela to agreement has not been divulged – yet that may be his strength – a quiet peacemaker

The EU is known to procrastinate on issues and a lot of chest beating and sabre rattling always takes place before a common position is finally agreed on. What we are talking about is the agreement to setup a mechanism which will allow Athens to secure normal interest rates in the commercial loans it is being forced to take to refinance its massive debts.

In the event, the solution was simple, eurozone countries pledged to make available two-thirds of €23 billion while the IMF will do the same for the other third, but only in the event of Greece not being able to secure a viable loan. Greece has not requested this money, but it wants it there on the table to alleviate lenders’ fears of it being labelled a risky client – hence lowering the interest rate to something in the region of 4.5 per cent instead of the current hefty 6.5 per cent it is paying. But enough about specifics and figures – they are actually coming out of my ears at this point.

Let us instead talk about whether we (eurozone members) have learned our lesson. The Greek crisis has made it clear that if one eurozone member falls, the rest will follow suit like a trail of dominoes. If you knock one down – the rest will follow. It is, after all, a common currency and if one member defaults, then the others do not have much hope of recovery as it is not the nation which is damaged, but the credibility of the common currency.

Anyway. While leaders were thrashing out the way to save Greece (and the euro), Portugal suddenly saw its credit rating drop one notch from AA to AA minus in the Fitch index. In addition, Portugal and Spain have massive deficits as a percentage of GDP. Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi said that EU leaders agreed that fiscal consolidation (tightening the purse strings) is the way forward to get all deficits back in line to then allow sustainable economic growth. He also said that fiscal prudence allowed Malta to weather the storm – fine – I could not agree more.

But, when I asked the PM whether or not Spain and Portugal (both of which have ballooning deficits close to 10 per cent, double figure unemployment and massive national debt) were discussed during the crisis talks – he said no.

Of course, one is not pointing the finger at anyone here, but I was absolutely flabbergasted. The penny dropped. Here are Europe’s leaders nattering on into the late hours discussing ways to get Greece out of the massive hole it has dug itself – and all the while we have two ticking bombs waiting to blow up in our faces.

And it begs the question… what are we going to do about it? I am quite sure that Spain and Portugal were not named specifically and told to do something about their situation in an effort to (a) not destabilise the euro as it gains in strength against the dollar and (b) not rattle anyone’s cage. In other words, the eurozone leaders have made the case clear that more must be done in terms of austerity measures to be adopted by countries that are in danger of defaulting. But is this enough?

On a personal level, I would say no. One cannot compare the Greece situation to that of Portugal and Spain. Greece had cooked its books for years and only came clean when Prime Minister George Papandreou was elected to replace Kostas Karamanlis (although one has to add that Mr Papandreou was PM in the legislature preceding that led by Mr Karamanlis). Spain and Portugal on the other hand, have not hidden their problems and have been transparent.

So why on earth was there no discussion on what to do to get these issues sorted out? Malta, one of the most fiscally prudent countries within the eurozone (yes, we actually are, with the last official deficit percentage being 3.2 per cent) had been slapped with an excessive deficit procedure warning in the past. Although such measures are the prerogative of the European Commission, one cannot begin to understand why the issue was not specifically addressed during this summit.

So, having followed this issue for months on end (to the point where even economists didn’t see it coming), I’ll have to ask… have we learned our lesson? Why are we not doing more to make sure that Portugal and Spain do not do a Greece? Assurances from individual member states are simply not enough. It’s our currency too... and don’t forget it.