2015-07-07 08:04:00

Greece resumes economic rescue talks


(Vatican Radio) The Greek government plunges into a new round of economic rescue talks with its creditors today, with Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras to attend an emergency eurozone summit, and the new finance minister, Euclid Tsakalotos, off to a meeting of his eurozone colleagues.

Listen to John Carr's report from Athens:

Two days after a Greek referendum strongly endorsed Tsipras’s defiant stand against the European establishment, the Syriza government here in Athens feels it has a stronger hand in the tortuous negotiations.

But time is pressing, as 3.5 billion euros in bond payments to the European Central Bank come due in exactly two weeks.

At a meeting of party leaders yesterday, Tsipras secured their long-awaited pledge of cooperation.  The sole exceptions were the Communist Party and far-right Golden Dawn, which remain adamantly Europhobe.

Also expected to sweeten European opinion is the removal of the controversial Yanis Varoufakis from the finance ministry and his replacement by the more moderate, British-educated Euclid Tsakalotos.

Meanwhile, the government here in Athens extended the bank closure by two more days, until midnight Wednesday.  It has asked for a bridge loan to help keep the banks solvent this week, but the reaction from the European Central Bank and Brussels so far has been pretty negative.








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