BERLIN (MNI) – A leading member of German Chancellor Angela
Merkel’s CDU/CSU-FDP government coalition demanded in a newspaper
interview released Tuesday that loans from the Eurozone to Greece should
have the status of senior debt.
“If Greece gets loans from Germany and the Eurozone countries then
these have to be paid back prior to existing debt,” CSU secretary
general Alexander Dobrindt told German business daily Financial Times
Deutschland (FTD) in an interview to be published on Wednesday. The CSU
is the junior partner in the coalition government.
Dobrindt demanded that loans from the Eurozone should have
seniority like those of the IMF. “We should insist on a subordination of
the existing creditors,” he said. It would only be fair if banks would
contribute to the aid measures for Greece by accepting that their claims
are reduced in rank, the party official argued.
Earlier today, Juergen Koppelin, a deputy leader of the FDP
parliamentary group, also demanded that the banks should contribute to
eventual aid for Greece.
“I expect banks themselves to make proposals [on helping Greece],
and if the banks won’t do this, politics will have to make proposals,”
Koppelin told German public radio Deutschlandradio. The conditions set
by governments for a participation of banks would then be markedly
tougher, he warned.
–Berlin bureau: +49-30-22 62 05 80; email: twidder@marketnews.com
[TOPICS: MT$$$$,M$$FX$,M$X$$$,M$$CR$,MGX$$$,M$G$$$,MFX$$$]