Eurozone members want conditionality for debt easing

By Sotiris Nikas

Certain eurozone countries are planning to push for a gradual rather than one-off lightening of Greece’s state debt linked to the implementation of so-called milestones, in the same way that the country’s bailout tranches are currently disbursed upon the completion of prior actions, the former president of the Finance Ministry’s Council of Economic Experts, Panos Tsakloglou, revealed on Tuesday.

Addressing a public meeting in Athens, Tsakloglou, who has represented the country at the Euro Working Group, said the maturity of the bilateral loans to Greece may be stretched to 50 years.

He went on to explain that some eurozone countries are less prone to be lenient toward Greece now that it has access to bond markets and that they would peg the easing of the Greek debt to conditionality, with Athens having to fulfill certain obligations before getting to the next level. Tsakloglou also estimated that talks on the debt will start at the end of this year.

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