Greece, you mean.

That the iPhone was also sold seperate without contract (unlocked) in Germany is entirely cosmetic to comply with law because Vodafone DE wanted to sue T-Mobile DE over this [1]. Say you're a German. If you'd buy the thing with contract you'd be cheaper off than when buying the iPhone without contract and then you don't even have a contract yet! So no German in their right mind bought the iPhone in Germany for 1000 EUR.

Instead, places in Europe where the iPhone is cheaper are: Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, and Greece. There is then also no import tax. Price was something like 450-600 EUR. What Vodafone NL did was a campaign with a 'supersim'. They recommended you'd buy an unlocked iPhone and combine this with their 'supersim' which costed like 13 EUR a month. This would yield you an approx similar experience as T-Mobile NL with some + (full HSDPA speed, far better coverage than T-Mobile NL) and some - (no visual voicemail) when compared. Price would be similar (30 EUR a month at T-Mobile NL for the cheapest package they offer). Both these contracts are for 2 years.

Personally, I prefer 1 year contracts. Although these are a bit more expensive. I also prefer unbranded (better for resale, looks better, no sim lock, paid in advance instead of higher monthly burden) but doing so is simply more expensive than a combination deal with either 1 of the 3 major telcos (Vodafone, T-Mobile, KPN).

[1] http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/iphone-wa...ted-325298.php