The rescue of Greece comes to an end after eight years. The country will end up with billions of loans and debt relief, agreed by eurozone countries. From August, Greece will again finance capital market. “The Greek crisis is over tonight,” said EU Finance Commissioner Pierre Moscovici. Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos said Greek Government was satisfied with agreement. “But government does not forget and will never forget what Greek people had to go through in se eight years.”
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In concrete terms, Greece is to receive a final tranche of 15 billion euros from third bailout programme which has been running since 2015. This is flanked by several measures to facilitate debt relief. For example, interest and repayments of older loans are expected to start ten years later than originally planned. In addition, Greece will again receive interest gains from euro partners.
This was already prospect of federal finance minister Olaf Scholz (SPD) in course of negotiations. Germany alone has since 2010 at least 2.9 billion euros in interest income, as shown by a response from federal government to Greens.
The third rescue programme of up to 86 billion euro, set up in summer of 2015, runs regularly in August. So far, country has received discounted loans of just under 50 billion euros.
IMF no longer doing so
Unlike originally planned and promised to Bundestag, International Monetary Fund is no longer financially involved in last aid. IMF chief Christine Lagarde said that time for a financial contribution was “clearly expired”. A statement by Eurogroup also stated that IMF assistance could “no longer be activated”.
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Greece has been reliant on support of European partners and IMF since 2010. In return for discounted loans amounting to just under 274 billion euros, country had to lay down austerity programmes and structural reforms. According to European Commission, 450 individual measures have been enforced in last three years alone. Greece is now recovering economic growth and surpluses. Yet one in five is still unemployed, and government debt is about 180 percent of economic output.
Still 2015, Greece seemed at height of crisis just before leaving common currency. EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker wrote on Twitter at night: “I will always fight for Greece to remain in heart of Europe. I pay tribute to Greeks for ir resilience and ir support for Europe. Their toils were not in vain. “
In addition to Greek aid, Scholz and his colleagues in Luxembourg also discussed planned reforms of eurozone and furr development of banking union. The debate should prepare EU summit in a week. But re were no concrete decisions.
