Eurozone’s talks focus on Greece

Crisis-hit Greece is already dependent on IMF and European aid

Eurozone financial ministers are to continue their talks in Brussels, with discussions now expected to focus on dire state of the Greek economy.

Greece got a 110bn euro ($136bn; £94bn) bail-out in 2010, but there is growing acceptance that it was not enough.

On Monday, the ministers approved a 78bn euro bail-out for Portugal.

The talks have been overshadowed by the arrest of IMF boss Dominique Strauss-Kahn in New York, on charges of the sexual assault of a hotel maid.

The IMF has also approved 1.58bn euros in new assistance to Ireland.

Billions of euros from the EU and the IMF should arrive in Lisbon by the end of this month, the BBC’s Chris Morris in Brussels reports.

But attention has already turned back to the first bail-out – that of Greece, our correspondent says.

EU commissioner Olli Rehn said loan for Portugal was “an important step”

He adds that the message from ministers in Brussels is clear – Athens has to do much more to restructure its economy and push ahead with a massive privatisation programme.

There is also been plenty of discussion of a second Greek bail-out or moves to lengthen the amount of time Greece has to pay back its huge mountain of debt.

The head of the eurozone group, Jean-Claude Juncker, said a “kind of reprofiling” of Greek debt had not been ruled out, but he eliminated the possibility of a “large restructuring”.

“Greece must still step up the implementation of its fiscal and structural reforms and start implementing the ambitious privatisation programme which is worth about 50 billion euros and do so without any further delay,” said Mr Juncker.

“This is very important part of reducing the debt burden of Greece as the 50 billion euros is equivalent to about 20% of the GDP of Greece.”

However, on Monday the finance ministers were urged to abandon “brutal austerity” as the answer to the Greek debt crisis and instead give struggling nation a a chance to restore their nosediving economies.

In a letter to the ministers, John Monks, the general secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation (Etuc), said: “The Etuc calls on you to immediately change course.”

Mr Monks added: “Brutal austerity, both in terms of public finance and in term of wages, is not working is instead undermining the economies such as Greece and Ireland.”

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