Greece Finmin: Looks to Return to Markets by Next Year: FT

FRANKFURT (MNI) – Greece’s Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou
is looking for his debt-laden Mediterranean country to return to the
capital markets by next year, he told the Financial Times in an
interview published Tuesday.

“It’s unlikely this year,” the minister said. However, “the amount
available to us [through the aid package being provided by the Eurozone
and the International Monetary Fund] is such that we don’t have to go
back to the markets until the first quarter of 2012,” he added.

On Sunday, Eurozone finance ministers agreed to a joint financial
assistance program with the IMF that would make up to E110 billion
available to Greece over three years. The Eurozone would provide E80
billion of that amount, in bilateral loans from member countries. The
IMF would provide the remaining E30 billion through a standby
arrangement.

The program has stringent conditions attached to it, including
structural reforms and reducing the bloated public sector through cuts
in pay and pensions.

“The public sector is dragging down the economy and not allowing it
to flourish,” the minister said.

While Papaconstantinou blamed the previous government for the high
public deficit, he admitted that his government was not completely
innocent. “We also governed for a long time,” he said.

–Frankfurt newsroom +49 69 720 142; email: frankfurt@marketnews.com

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