Eurozone finance ministers failed at an emergency meeting Wednesday to strike a deal to unblock bailout funds needed to keep Greece from bankruptcy and said they would try again next week.
The Eurogroup ministers said in a statement at the end of talks that ended in the small hours that no deal had been reached and they would meet again next Monday “for further technical work on some elements of the package”.
The ministers had gone into the negotiations expressing confidence that a deal would be reached to unblock 31.2 billion euros ($40 billion) in aid to Greece and resolve a rift with the IMF over how to get the debt-stricken state’s economy back on track.
But the meeting ended with a statement saying only that they “made progress in identifying a consistent package of credible initiatives aimed at making a further substantial contribution to the sustainablity of Greek government debt”.
“It was progress but we have to do a little bit more,” International Monetary Fund (IMF) boss Christine Lagarde told reporters as she left the meeting.
A major bone of contention was whether to give Greece, which faces a sixth year in recession, an extra two years to arrive at a point where it can raise its own funds.
Jean-Claude Juncker, who presides the Eurogroup of finance ministers from the 17 countries that use the single currency, had called for that option but Lagarde very publicly disagreed in the run-up to the talks in Brussels.
Eurogroup ministers fail to strike Greek bail-out deal
