The finance ministers of the eurozone discuss Greece again on Monday in Brussels to try to find a difficult agreement on reforms and financial assistance country, and thus avoid a new crisis.
This extraordinary meeting will take place when the reforms demanded in exchange for financial assistance agreed in the summer of 2015 have not yet received approval from creditors (European Union and International Monetary Fund) after ten months of negotiations, blocking the delivery of more aid.
Greece is “almost reached” the objectives of the reforms demanded by creditors, estimated the President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, in an interview published Sunday in several German newspapers.
the 19 Eurogroup finance ministers will also discuss, under pressure from the IMF, how to lighten the abysmal Greek debt (about 180% of GDP). The international monetary institution makes this a condition for participating in the aid program.
Juncker confirmed that the Eurogroup will address the debt issue, recalled that an outright reduction it is not in the agenda.
Greece, which Parliament must approve on Sunday after 48 hours of general strike two key measures of the third aid plan -Reform 86,000 million pension and tax- . needs an agreement of the eurozone to access new funds
the country has so far received 21,400 million euros and must pay 2,300 million euros to the European Central Bank (ECB (Toronto: ECB-PA. TO – news)) on 20 July. On Saturday, Greek Finance Minister Euclides Tsakalotos warned his European counterparts “a new Greek crisis” in a letter to which he had AFP access
-. ‘Turn the page’ –
in the letter, Tsakalotos calls on the Eurogroup to give approval for the proposed reforms, “which would help the country [to recover] the confidence of investors and recovery” and would indicate that “Greece has moved on and that the country is no longer at risk, finally! “.
However, differences remain deep, aggravated by differences of opinion between the EU and the IMF on how to make Greece get achieve the targeted primary surplus (before payment of debt interest ) limited to 3.5% of GDP in 2018.
the IMF believes that this target is too ambitious, unless additional austerity measures vote now.
Athens promises to fulfill the commitment and prefers ensure that, if it fails, further cuts will be automatically applied in public spending.
“It is not very credible,” nor “desirable” because this would jeopardize even more a public service already weakened, considered the director of the IMF, Christine Lagarde, in a letter to Eurogroup consulted by AFP. For its part, Greece seems to take for granted the support of the European institutions to their “permanent automatic correction mechanism of public finances”.
– The EU, fearful of ‘Brexit’ –
“I do not see why such a mechanism associated with a package of reforms [already committed], it would be more than enough” to open the way to release more aid, Tsakalotos claimed in his letter.
With the support of his French counterpart Michel Sapin, the Greek minister refused to block requests IMF last April, urging the Greek Parliament to implement new measures to save 3,000 million additional euros.
the IMF, however, pressed in the direction of leftist government of Alexis Tsipras, getting creditors to begin debate on debt relief, claimed by Athens.
Last week, the European Commissioner for Economic Affairs, Pierre Moscovici, said he saw “no reason” to fear “a crisis situation” comparable to 2015, when Greece brushed off the area EUR. “This year we will have a great Greek crisis,” said German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble.
According to the president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, on 3 May, EU leaders want a deal on Greece “very quickly”.
With the fear of possible departure from the UK EU (a “Brexit ‘) as a backdrop, the leaders want to settle the Greek negotiations before the vote on the permanence of the British in the Union, on 23 June.
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