Athens: Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras urged the Eurozone to confirm early next year it would again write-down part of his country’s huge debt, in a Sunday interview to liberal daily Kathimerini.
“We insist that a decision for another reduction of our debt should be taken in the spring, as soon as our amount of primary surplus has been announced,” Samaras said.
In November last year, Eurozone finance ministers agreed that a new write-down of Greece’s huge debt would be possible if the heavily indebted country fulfilled the terms of its bailout deal and achieved primary surplus.
Greece has been relying on EU-IMF rescue loans for its economic survival since 2010.
After six years of continuous recession, the indebted country has predicted a slight primary surplus - not including debt servicing costs — for 2014.
A tough 2014 budget approved last week by the parliament foresees a 0.6 per cent GDP growth.
But Greece is still negotiating with its troika of EU, IMF and European Central Bank creditors, and the two sides disagree on the level of a forecasted financing gap for 2014 and the measures that need to be taken to cover it.
An agreement with the troika is necessary to unblock a vital one-billion-euro slice of financial aid.
Other thorny issues include seized property auctions, a new property tax, state jobs layoffs and the slow pace of privatisation.
In the interview, Samaras talked about possible disagreements between the creditors.
“We are negotiating with three different entities.... They all agree on helping us, but they have not yet reached an agreement, between them, on how to help us. We want no involvement in this disagreement,” he said.
