|
 However, with Greece fast running out money, sources close to the
talks with the International Monetary Fund, the European Commission
and the European Central Bank said there was still no breakthrough
on crucial sticking points over pension and labor market reforms and
budget targets.
Tsipras, who has taken personal charge of the negotiations, told
parliament in Athens: "I am confident that we will soon have a happy
ending and that despite the difficulties... we will carry out the
agreement which will be concluded soon in Europe."
The leftist leader said his government was "doing whatever it should
in order to reach ... an honest and mutually beneficial agreement
with our partners", but gave no indication of yielding on the
lenders' core demands for painful reforms.
The government has said its "red lines" are that it will not make
further pension cuts or legislate to ease layoffs in the private
sector. It has given some ground on privatizations and value added
tax but wide gaps remain.
 In Rome, Eurogroup chairman Jeroen Dijsselbloem said Monday's
meeting of finance ministers of the currency area would not be
decisive, but negotiations were moving forward. Greece's partners
would only consider debt relief once Athens committed to and
completed its current bailout program, he said.
Italian Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan told a joint news
conference after talks with Dijsselbloem he was confident of a deal
in "a reasonable time frame".
Despite the slow pace of detailed negotiations, EU officials said
they were keen to ensure the Eurogroup sends a positive message on
Monday that a deal with Greece is in the works and to avoid another
confrontation like the one with Greek Finance Minister Yanis
Varoufakis in Riga last month.
However, they said the outcome would not be enough to prompt the ECB
to allow Greek banks on emergency liquidity support to buy more
short-term treasury bills to ease the government's funding crunch.
A senior EU source said Brussels believed Athens has enough money
left to pay a crucial 750 million euro debt installment to the IMF
on Tuesday and meet other payment obligations in May.
It was essential to reach a deal by the end of May to allow time for
some parliaments to approve the agreement and authorize disbursement
of 7.2 billion euros left in Greece's existing bailout, which
expires at the end of June.
[to top of second column] |
GERMANY CRUCIAL
As so often since the euro zone's debt crisis began in 2010, much
hinges on the position of Germany, the EU's main paymaster and
Greece's biggest creditor nation.
Tsipras has spoken by telephone to Chancellor Angela Merkel several
times this week, a German government spokeswoman said, most recently
on Wednesday night. He gave no details.
A source briefed on German government thinking said Merkel was
willing to take a deal to continue financial support for Greece to
an increasingly skeptical parliament provided Tsipras made serious
commitments on the key reforms.
The source said Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble and a growing
number of lawmakers in Merkel's conservative CDU party were
skeptical about Greece's ability to stay in the euro zone.
Another potential hurdle may lie in Finland, where the head of a
Eurosceptic party that came second in a general election and has
agreed to enter a new governing coalition said it would make sense
for Greece to leave the single currency.
Timo Soini, leader of the Finns Party and possible next finance
minister, declined to comment in a television interview on what
position the next government would take on a third Greek bailout,
saying that in a coalition "no one dictates nothing".
Asked whether he would still like to see Greece thrown out of the
euro zone, he said: "That would perhaps be the clearest option for
everybody, also for the Greeks."
Deputy finance ministers in the Eurogroup Working Group, which
prepares decisions for ministers, were to hold a special
teleconference on Greece later on Friday to review the state of the
negotiations, which may continue into the weekend.
(Additional reporting by Michelle Martin in Berlin, Paul Taylor and
Jan Strupczewski in Brussels and Renee Maltezou and George
Georgiopoulos in Athens; Writing by Paul Taylor; editing by Anna
Willard)
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