Brussels, 22/06/2015 (Agence Europe) - Eurogroup asked the institutions on Monday 22 June to closely examine the new Greek reform proposals in the hope of agreement being reached later this week. The Eurogroup meeting on Monday mostly followed the procedure for preparing for the eurozone summit. It was only on Monday morning that the most recent version of the Greek concessions were received so the institutions (European Commission, ECB and IMF) weren't able to brief ministers on the details.
“Given the very little time that the institutions have had to look at them, they were unable to give us a full and in-depth assessment. So they gave us a first impression. Eurogroup has urged them to work closely together with the Greek authorities; to start immediately with those proposals, going through them, getting into the specifics, doing calculations on them and working on a list of prior actions, which is the key thing that it boils down to,” explained the head of Eurogroup, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, at a press conference. He said the parties needed to work at the technical level with a view to reaching agreement later this week. Vice-president of the European Commission Valdis Dombrovskis tweeted that a second ministerial meeting will take place this week. It seems logical that would happen before the normal summit of heads of state on Thursday 25 June so that the Greek question is not an obstacle to the summit. Irish finance minister Michael Noonan said this special Eurogroup meeting might take place on Thursday morning.
According to a close source, while positions are converging on budget targets, more details are wanted from Greece about pension reforms, company taxation and VAT. On the latter point, a new Greek proposal would introduce VAT for medicines and books at 6% and 13% for electricity. For pensions, the proposal suggests the pre-retirement mechanisms in 2016, and EKAS (a supplement for pensions of under €700 a month) in 2018.
Upon his arrival at Eurogroup, Michael Noonan said there had been confusion during the night, “with alternative versions of the Greek proposals coming in,” with a first draft arriving on Sunday evening ahead of the version that arrived on Monday morning. Dijsselbloem said that there was not much difference between the two versions. A eurozone source said that the new list of proposals was longer, included figures and wasn't just a brainstorming.
The European Commission welcomed the new Greek proposals, but ministers, Germany's finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble for example, said that they wanted the joint opinion of all three institutions.
Finnish finance minister Alexander Stubb said: “This seems to be a little bit of a Monday where we have wasted a lot of air miles both on the finance ministers' side and on the prime ministers' side, because I don't foresee a breakthrough today” in Brussels.
The ECB has raised the upper limit on emergency aid for Greek banks and is expected to examine the situation again on Tuesday. (Elodie Lamer)