ATHENS — Euro zone officials on Monday approved the release of €2.8 billion in loans to Greece, the country’s Finance Ministry said, paving the way for the approval of an additional €6 billion installment of aid at a meeting of the currency union’s finance ministers in mid-May.
The Greek Parliament late Sunday approved a controversial plan to dismiss 15,000 civil servants by the end of next year as part of a new package of economic measures that the country must enforce in order to receive continued financing from the troika of foreign creditors: the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the European Commission.
The €2.8 billion, or $3.7 billion, approved Monday in Brussels was originally to have been disbursed in March but was delayed after negotiations between Greece and the troika stalled over the creditors’ demands for civil service cuts.
“There was a positive evaluation of the implementation of the Greek program and clear references to the decisiveness of the government in proceeding with reforms set out in the program,” the Greek Finance Ministry said.
The disbursement of the €6 billion installment of loans, in May, is dependent on the adoption of further measures by Athens, including an overhaul of the tax collection system.
The government’s latest measures passed into law in a vote held shortly before midnight on Sunday with 168 votes in the 300-seat House.
A last-minute amendment allowing the local authorities to hire young Greeks for less than the minimum wage of €586 a month fueled angry protests by the political opposition. But the inclusion of measures intended to ease some of the financial burden on homeowners, including a 15 percent reduction in a new property tax, clinched the support of lawmakers in the three-party ruling coalition.
Defending the bill, the finance minister, Yannis Stournaras, insisted that there was no choice but to implement the measures. “Greece is still cut off from the markets,” he told lawmakers, adding that the government’s chief aim was to achieve a primary surplus before seeking a further “drastic” reduction of its debt, which stood at 160 percent of gross domestic product at the end of last year.
His claims were derided by the opposition. “With blood, tears and looting, they will achieve surpluses like those achieved by Ceausescu in Romania and Pinochet in Chile,” said Alexis Tsipras, leader of the main leftist opposition party, Syriza, which wants Greece to revoke its agreement with the troika.
“Claim back your lives and your country that they are stealing,” he said as a few hundred people, mostly civil servants, staged a low-key protest outside Parliament.
The ruling coalition, led by Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, faces a difficult balancing act to reassure its foreign creditors and its long-suffering citizens, who have seen their incomes dwindle by a third and unemployment skyrocket to 27 percent in the past three years.
Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/30/business/global/30iht-eugreece30.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
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