IMF threatens to pull out of Greek rescue

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian

IMF threatens to pull out of Greek rescue

No-holds-barred letter by Christine Lagarde comes days
before eurozone ministers discuss help for Athens

Helena Smith in Athens
Friday 6 May 2016 18.51 BST

Hopes of an end to the impasse between Greece and its creditors have appeared to evaporate after asurprise intervention from the International Monetary Fund.

In a letter - leaked three days before eurozone finance ministers are due to discuss how best to put the crisis-plagued country back on its feet - IMF chief Christine Lagarde issued her most explicit warning yet: either foreign lenders agree to restructure Greece’s runaway debt or the Washington-based organisation will pull out of rescue plans altogether.

“For us to support Greece with a new IMF arrangement, it is essential that the financing and debt relief from Greece’s European partners are based on fiscal targets that are realistic because they are supported by credible measures to reach them,” she wrote, lamenting the lack of structural reforms underlying Athens’ abortive adjustment programme so far.

Six years have elapsed since Greece, revealing a deficit that was four times higher than previously thought, received its first loans from a bailout programme that has since exceeded more than €240bn (£190bn) in emergency funding. Since a third €86bn bailout last summer, talks have been largely deadlocked.

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Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/06/imf-threatens-greece-eurozone-christine-lagarde

[Ghost Dog]

1. ... As per the discussion leaked a month ago

at wikileaks:

by Julian Assange
Today, 2nd April 2016, WikiLeaks publishes the records of a 19 March 2016 teleconference between the top two IMF officials in charge of managing the Greek debt crisis - Poul Thomsen, the head of the IMF's European Department, and Delia Velkouleskou, the IMF Mission Chief for Greece. The IMF anticipates a possible Greek default co-inciding with the United Kingdom's referendum on whether it should leave the European Union ('Brexit').

"This is going to be a disaster" remarks Velkouleskou in the meeting.

According to the internal discussion, the IMF is planning to tell Germany that it will abandon the Troika (composed of the IMF, European Commission and the European Central Bank) if the IMF and the Commission fail to reach an agreement on Greek debt relief...