Eurasia Press & News
PARIS–France will wait for a report of a troika of European Union, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank officials to ascertain the state of Greece’s finances, before deciding on the best way to approach the problem, President Francois Hollande said Monday.
“The troika report is expected in coming days. There is a Eurogroup meeting planned for the beginning of November and it is in that framework that we will look at the most effective ways, if Greece holds onto its commitments, to find a sustainable solution,” Mr. Hollande said.
While these words echo a declaration by the German finance ministry last week, the French president refrained from ruling out the possibility of a further restructuring of Greek debt, something German officials said this morning was “Out of question.”
German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble on Sunday also called the potential debt restructuring “unrealistic” in an interview on German radio station Deutschlandfunk, but responded more positively to the possibility of a debt buyback program that has been suggested by ECB officials and would be designed to reduce Greek debt without cost to the German public.
Mr. Hollande met Monday with the head of the IMF, Christine Lagarde, along with the heads of the International Labor Organization, the World Bank, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and the World Trade Organization. He was speaking at a press conference following the meeting.
The international officials will travel to Berlin Tuesday to meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
