Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Wednesday said his government rejected a proposal for Greek debt relief earlier in the week that was presented at the Eurogroup meeting in Brussels by German FinMin Wolfgang Schaeuble.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Wednesday said his government rejected a proposal for Greek debt relief earlier in the week that was presented at the Eurogroup meeting in Brussels by German FinMin Wolfgang Schaeuble.
“…we considered that it (Schaeuble offer) did not correspond with the sacrifices endured by the Greek people,” he told reporters at the energy and environment ministry.
Lack of a deal for coveted debt relief and another "hiccup" in concluding the year-long delayed second review of the Greek program at Monday's Eurogroup was yet another letdown for the Tsipras and his leftist-rightist government coalition. Opinion polls over the past several months have confirmed as much, with the previously radical Greek prime minister and his formerly anti-bailout and anti-austerity SYRIZA party plummeting in the polls.
Days after jokingly saying he may wear a tie to celebrate medium-term debt relief and roughly two years after promising party supporters to make markets “dance” to SYRIZA’s tune, the perennially “tie-less” Tsipras said his government’s strategic goal is to now attain the “stable ability to borrow, with low interest rates after the end of the third memorandum, namely, after August 2018
“We believe this goal is near, whether or not we receive a solution for the debt that isn’t so optimistic, such as the one offered by the German minister, or whether we receive a better solution – one which we continue to demand and negotiate for.”
The leftist Greek premier qualified his optimism over a coming foray into the markets after the current bailout ends by saying conditions have now emerged in Greece that allow investments to avoid high risks and to attain higher performances, i.e. profits.
He also said the country now has an economy that has been reformed and remains an oasis of stability amid surrounding instability.
In again forecasting positive developments after the Eurogroup meeting on June 15 – the latest “unofficial deadline” in a succession of set and missed deadlines over the past year – Tsipras promised new (overseas) investments and a necessary planning for the “productive reorganization” of the country.