which eu countries supported the piigs bailout 
the leaders of france and germany as the core industrial economies of the european union played a key role in providing debt relief for the peripheral economies and restoring the confidence of the international credit markets in addition the european central bank also provided important rescue packages the bottom linepiigs refers to several countries at the periphery of the eurozone economy in the aftermath of the 2008 recession those countries portugal spain greece ireland and italy had high levels of debt that threatened to cause a renewed financial crisis although the crisis has since been averted the acronym is now considered derisive and has fallen out of use 