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This article was published June 22, 2015 at 7:10.
The last change is the 22 June 2015 at 08:09.
It was a weekend of frantic contacts between Greece and its European partners in an effort to find agreement on new aid to the Mediterranean country. Athens has come up with new proposals aiming to wrest a compromise. Today they are expected before a meeting of finance ministers of the euro area and then a summit at the level of heads of state and government of the monetary union. The new Greek ideas were considered by the European Commission “a good basis” for discussion.
During a council of ministers yesterday morning, the greek government has come up with new proposals to credit institutions (the Commission , the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund). The aim is to conclude the current memorandum expiring at the end of the month and rip new aid to 7.2 billion euro in a few days from a refund of 1.6 billion euro to the Fund. The setting is dramatic, marked by a flight of bank deposits.
The chief of staff of the Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, Martin Selmayr, said that on the night the Greek proposals are “a good basis for making progress at the summit of the euro area”. Contacts at the summit there have been throughout the weekend. Tsipras is looking for a difficult compromise that puts both the creditors agree, is his party. Syriza is divided. Many in the movement of the radical left are against a compromise that requires some form of new austerity.
“The prime minister presented the proposals to the three leaders,” he said yesterday in a statement the government greek , referring to European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, French President François Hollande and Chancellor Angela Merkel. Athens believes that the proposals will lead to “a final solution” of the question. So far, the government has refused to put his hand significantly to three areas identified by creditors: the pension system, labor law and taxation.
In words, the euro-zone countries appear inflexible. They want respect for the agreements to grant new aid. They know, however, that at the end of the month a greek failure to repay the IMF is likely to result in a dramatic chain of events lead up to the exit of Greece from the euro zone. The impact of monetary union would be economic, but also political. Greece would slide into chaos, damaging the same image of Europe.
In this sense, the government greek know that lenders have every incentive to successfully close the negotiations. Throughout the weekend, the European Commission has been working informally for a solution. This does not mean that an agreement has already been written. The risk of a hiccup remains, also because there is resentment in many European countries, if not anger, towards Greece and its negotiating tactics. The country is caught between rescue and failure.
“Rationally are optimistic about an agreement – explained Saturday a European head, before the announcement of the arrival of new proposals Greek – but I can not have a dose of pessimism. Nell’establishment greek there is a vein imponderable. ” Among the Eurogroup meeting, which is expected to start at 12:30, and the euro area summit, set for 19:00, there will be a meeting between Tsipras and the presidents of the main institutions involved in the negotiations.
In fact, the aim of these days is to find an agreement to extend the memorandum which expires at the end of June, the only way – given the tight deadlines – to continue to negotiate with Greece and grant if new loans. Today, in addition to two extraordinary summits, there will also be a meeting of the Governing Council of the ECB to decide whether to increase again the loans to the banking sector greek, victim of a flight of deposits that last week amounted to 4 to 5 billion euro.
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