EU mulls worst-case scenario on Greece
EU officials revealed Friday that they had held their first formal talks on the worst-case scenario for Greece, but the darkening outlook failed to fluster Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who holed up with his negotiators after proclaiming his optimism, Reuters reports.
No one knows, least of all in Athens or Brussels, whether the anti-austerity government can reach a deal with its international lenders before an end-June deadline to avoid putting the country in grave danger of crashing out of the eurozone.
But senior European Union officials are taking no chances, and have discussed a series of scenarios, several officials told Reuters. These included a potential Greek default on a 1.6 billion euro ($1.8 billion) payment to the International Monetary Fund, the global lender of last resort, at the end of this month, they said.
While Europe let loose a barrage of warnings, the leftist Greek government exuded calm and optimism. A cheerful Tsipras was mobbed by supporters late Thursday at an open-air concert to celebrate the reopening of a TV station, still wearing the blue suit he had worn at crisis talks that morning in Brussels.
His boisterous mood belied his tough talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande Wednesday, and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker Thursday. Juncker jokingly called the meeting hall a “torture room.”