Brussels, 09/02/2012 (Agence Europe) - The three parties in the Greek coalition government reached agreement on Thursday 9 February on the austerity measures and structural adjustment policies that they will have to introduce if they are to receive international financial aid of some €130 billion. In the late afternoon, the eurozone finance ministers were making their way to Brussels to examine the Greek agreement. A new day of trade union action has been announced in Athens on Friday to protest against the extra austerity measures that the Greeks are expected to swallow.
General agreement on the contents of the new structural adjustment programme was reached ahead of the Eurogroup meeting, announced the offices of Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos in a press release. Socialist party PASOK, conservative party New Democracy and the nationalist LAOS party have not, however, managed to agree on cuts in pensions so the final €300 million in spending cuts will be made in the defence budget. The 22% cut in the minimum wage in the private sector and the scrapping of 15,000 jobs from the civil service have been agreed upon. Savings of 1.5% of GDP will be made in 2012, and the Greek parliament will be voting on the second bailout on Sunday 12 February.
The main banks and other private lenders to Greece, represented by the International Institute of Finance, are working on the details of a partial write-down of the Greek debt, with the aim of reducing it from 160% of GDP to 120% by 2020.
Irish Economics Minister Michael Noonan said on his arrival in Brussels for the Eurogroup meeting that a solution to the Greek question would stabilise the whole of the eurozone, but he would not say that the second bailout package had been formally endorsed, leaving that until after the Eurogroup meeting. He did say, however, that Ireland wants to start rolling over its debt unaided on the money markets later this year. (MB/transl.fl)