An advisor to the former Greek finance minister has said the European Central Bank (ECB) approach to Ireland was "extraordinarily heavy-handed and anti-democratic".

James Galbraith is a professor at the University of Texas - and also spent five months advising Yanis Varoufakis.

"I think the Eurozone damaged itself enormously with its conduct in the Greek matter; which was not dissimilar to the conduct that we now learned that the ECB had with respect to Ireland in 2010" he told Newstalk Luncthime.

It comes after the Finance Minister Michael Noonan said the ECB warned Ireland against burning bank bondholders, and that Jean-Claude Trichet phoned him to say "a bomb would go off" in Dublin if that happened.

"This was a period in which we saw the brute power of the creditor institutions", Mr Galbraith says.

"I think that, for the moment, the Greek 'revolt' on these matters - which was a very well-reasoned and moderate revolt - has been suppressed, the situation will not remain stable for very long".

"In some sense the government was in an impossible position because the Greek people were hoping for a better economic policy while remaining in the Eurozone...so the government had a mandate which it could not achieve".

Mr Varoufakis quit his post after Greek voters decisively rejected a tough bailout deal in July.

"The power has passed in a very decisive way to these major institutions - the ECB is unique among Central Banks in the world in having no accountability to an elected authority to speak of".

And in terms of the Irish economic recovery, Mr Galbraith says we should "enjoy it while it lasts...I don't think you can count on an indefinite prosperity emerging from the current line of policy".

Listen to his full interview below: