Brussels, 10/04/2015 (Agence Europe) - Greek media report that talks between the Greek government and the Brussels group (European Commission, ECB, IMF and EFSF) will resume on Monday 13 April. In an interview on Friday with Portuguese newspaper Diàrio Económico, the French prime minister, Manuel Valls, said a more profound reform list would be required.
Valls said that progress had been made but not enough and the Greek government would therefore be asked to continue their efforts as time was running out. Andreas Dombret of the Bundesbank board said in Johannesburg: “Further assistance can only be granted to Greece if it applies sound public finances.”
On Thursday, Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis said in an interview with Bloomberg TV: “The negotiations are proceeding quite well. It is in our mutual interest to strike a deal by the 24th (April at the Eurogroup meeting, Ed.), and I'm sure we will.” IMF director general Christine Lagarde said the IMF had received a repayment from Greece on Thursday and told CNBC that “talks were difficult on an almost daily basis.”
Varoufakis told a conference in Paris on Thursday that he wouldn't sign a document just to get the next aid instalment and Greece would not make any false promises. Greek media talk of a possible meeting of Eurogroup on 29 April if agreement is not reached on the detail of reforms by the Eurogroup meeting on the 24th.
Varoufakis explained that Greece needed deeper discussions with its lenders to find long-term solutions to the country's problems, such as the exact size of the primary budget surplus (not including debt-servicing), how to encourage investment in the private sector and management of the country's debt. “At the very same time we need a fiscal plan that makes sense,” he said, adding that the target for 2016 of a primary surplus of 4.5% of GDP “meant continued austerity that is self-defeating because debt rises as a result of a collapse of GD” He criticised the way the eurozone was established. “I don't believe anyone would have become a member of this eurozone, the way it's designed,” Varoufakis said: “But, it's one thing to say we should never have joined and another to say we should leave it.” (Elodie Lamer)