The real story is that this problem has been kicked into the weeds. Greece is still fundamentally over spending; it has been spared some momentary pain, but there is far more to come. My gut feel is that it will take the larger part of 30 years for Greece to right itself unless Germany and France find some way to "pay" Greece its "dues" for keeping the Euro "artificially" low and bolstering Northern European exports to the rest of the world.
Germany and France is part of western Europe. In Northern Europe only Finland and Estonia (as of very recently) has the Euro.
You're right of course. However, in covering the crisis people have often referred to a rough north/south divide among Euro countries. I think he was referring to big "northern" exporters like Germany and France, vs "southern" Mediterranean countries like Greece, Spain, and Portugal.