Greece denies euro zone exit plan

Prime minister rejects rumours of his country getting ready to quit the single currency.

greece

George Papandreou, the Greek prime minister, has denied that his country is getting ready to leave the euro zone. Rumours that Athens was quitting the single currency has lead to a fall in the value of the euro.

Finance ministers from the Eurozone’s biggest economies have been holding talks on Greece’s debt crisis. Greece’s sovereign debt stands at $470bn.

That is more than a year-and-a-half of its entire economic output. The European Union and the International Monetary Fund agreed a loan of $160bn in May last year.

The terms were eased in the spring but the financial markets consider the high repayments as unsustainable, leading to growing fears of a default which could spell disaster for the euro zone.

Tim Friend reports.

Source: Al Jazeera