Institutions’ return to Athens still unclear

The Euroworking Group meeting held on Monday in Brussels with the participation of the heads of the institutions did not reach any agreement on when the ‘Quartet’ will return to Athens so as to move a step closer to the conclusion of the program review.

According to government sources, Greece and European partners put a great pressure on IMF to explain why the Fund blocks the return of the representatives of the institutions in Greece.

Specifically, Alternate Finance Minister Giorgos Chouliarakis posed many questions about IMF’s stance but without receiving any answer from IMF’s representative Delia Velculescu.

Government sources said that there is a gap among the institutions and European partners (European Commission, ECB and ESM) do not comply with the requirements of the IMF.

According to the same sources, other member states also put great pressure on IMF that wanted to know “why it operates outside August program and how come it talks about 4% of GDP, while the assessment in August mentioned that the adjustment should be 1% of GDP , especially when economic data is better?”. But, the IMF did not answer on that either.