–Says Expects Markets To Continue To Stabilise
BRUSSELS (MNI) – Greece wants to come back to the international
financial markets much sooner than the joint Eurozone and International
Monetary Fund rescue plan foresees, Finance Minister George
Papaconstantinou told reporters on Tuesday.
Heavily-indebted Greece – which currently has a budget deficit more
than four times the EU’s stipulated 3% limit – has accepted a E110
billion bail-out plan from its Eurozone partners and the International
Montary Fund in return for complying with a strict set of guidelines
designed to curb its massive debt.
“The programme has been designed so that Greece is able to stay
away from the financial markets through the end of 2011 and the first
quarter of 2012. We don’t expect that to be the case, we want to come
back to markets much sooner,” Papaconstantinou told reporters after a
meeting of European Union finance ministers here on Tuesday.
The finance minister said he had updated the other European Union
finance ministers on the progress Greece was making on its austerity
measures.
“The programme is on track, the budget in the first four months of
the year shows a reduction in the deficit exceeding 40%,”
Papaconstantinou said. “The rest of the measures are underway and will
be on time,” he said.
Papaconstantinou said the measures Greece has taken “are more than
enough to attain the deficit reduction target we have set at just above
8% at the end of this year.”
“The market is begining to stabilise and this is good news, and I
think it will continue to do so,” he said.
–Brussels: 0032 487 (0) 32 803 665; email: echarlton@marketnews.com
[TOPICS: MT$$$$,M$$FX$,M$$EC$,M$X$$$,M$$CR$,MGX$$$]
