Greece sees 7.5 billion euros in rescue loans cleared

The precondition for the waiver is that the euro zone bailout fund ESM will disburse the next, 7.5 billion euro trance of aid to Greece prior to the decision, as now scheduled.

The money will be used to meet impending repayments to Greece’s global creditors and to help clear domestic arrears. The remaining €2.8 billion will be unblocked after Greece makes further required reforms.

Debt-laden Greece urgently needs the fresh funding to pay back debt to the tune of more than 3 billion euros due in July.

The finance chiefs endorsed the disbursement at a meeting of the European Stability Mechanism, the 19-nation bloc’s firewall fund, in Luxembourg on Thursday.

Greece has fulfilled all the necessary measures to receive a new slice of bailout money from its global creditors.

“This will bring real oxygen to the Greek economy”, European Union Economic Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici told reporters after the resolution.

For more details on the bailout, the ESM’s press release can be read here.

Speaking at an event in Austria with the country’s finance minister Dr Hans Jörg Schelling, Christine Lagarde said Greece’s debt was unsustainable as it is close to 180% of GDP.

International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde, who took part in the Luxembourg talks on Thursday, said she was “very encouraged” by the measures agreed between Greece and its European partners, including the EU Commission and the European Central Bank (ECB).

Largarde said: “We believe for us to be engaged under a programme, a debt operation would have to be assessed on the basis of a new debt sustainability analysis that would be handled on the basis of reforms conducted, the general framework, and growth assumptions that will all be adequately measured later on”.