Friday 22 May 2015

Greece, creditors not in talks on extending bailout: Commission

In World Economy News 22/05/2015

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Greece and its creditors are not in talks on extending the country’s bailout until the autumn, with negotiations focused on meeting the program’s conditions by the time it expires in June, a senior European Commission official said.
Greece and the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund — the institutions representing the lenders — are in intensive talks on what reforms Athens must implement to get the funds remaining under the current bailout deal.
The negotiators are running out of time to clinch a deal before Greece runs out of money next month and German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported a senior EU official as saying euro zone countries were considering extending the bailout over the summer.
Asked if such talks were taking place, Commission Vice President for the euro Valdis Dombrovskis told Reuters:
“Not at the so-called Brussels group,” referring to the group of officials from the creditor institutions and Greece who meet to negotiate in Brussels.
“The main scenario is to complete the current bailout program which runs until end of June,” Dombrovskis said.

Source: Reuters (Reporting Joern Poltz; writing by By Jan Strupczewski; editing by Philip Blenkinsop)