Brussels, le 15/10/2012 (Agence Europe) - Athens is not expected to agree with its international lenders on new savings and other measures ahead of the 18 and 19 October European Summit, explained Greek finance minister Yannis Stournaras in Greek newspaper Kathimerini on Monday 15 October. In the same newspaper on the previous day, however, Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras said that he was certain that agreement would be reached ahead of the 18-19 October summit. Greek newspapers say the problem lies in the 89 priority actions agreed upon in March as part of the second Greek bailout programme which Eurogroup says have to be introduced by 18 October this year (see EUROPE 10706). There is talk of a special eurozone summit to discuss the matter at the end of October.
Despite the question marks, the talks with Greece have been taking place in a positive attitude since the official visit of the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, to Athens recently (see EUROPE 10706). A European source says that at the European Summit this week, heads of state are expected to praise the recent efforts by the Greek government, describing them indeed as praiseworthy, a feeling shared across the board.
On Monday, Greek deputy finance minister Christos Staikouras said that the country's lenders had underestimated the recessionary impact of the austerity measures introduced by the government since 2010, which has led to lower-than-forecast budget reductions. He said the only way to deal with this was to be careful to drip-feed the measures.
At the autumn summits of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank last week, IMF director general Christine Lagarde said that it would take two extra years for Athens to meet its budget deficit reduction targets. Over the weekend, French economy minister Pierre Moscovici said he was open to Greece being given two more years, and his German counterpart, Wolfgang Schaüble, said he was prepared to talk about the speed of debt reduction, but not whether it was needed. He ruled out any possibility of Greece being allowed to go bankrupt. (EL and MB/transl.fl)