On Tuesday, euro zone finance ministers accepted a list of Greek reform proposals and gave Athens a four-month extension of its bailout program while warning that the reforms must be expanded in detail before new bailout funding would be released. International Monetary Fund (IMF) managing director Christine Lagarde called the proposals "sufficiently comprehensive to be a valid starting point" but said they lacked "clear assurances."
Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis said implementing new legislation concerning corruption and tax evasion is his top priority. As to whether European officials will approve each and every measure passed in parliament, he said "there is going to be a great deal of toing and froing between us and the institutions and our partners."
Trust Sought
Greece's new government is eager to re-establish trust with the rest of Europe.
"The reason why we have this four-month period is to re-establish bonds of trust between us and our European partners as well as the IMF in order to build a new contract between us and our partners so as to put an end to this debt inflationary spiral," Yanis Varoufakis said in an interview in Athens.
The trained economist was also critical of the tense negotiation process with euro zone finance ministers, saying they were dominated by "legalisms."
"You know what I think the main problem is, European finance ministerial meetings are seldom about finance, they're more about process and rules…and I'm not good at that. I think that when we're talking about macroeconomics, when we're talking about Greece's recovery, I don't think we have the moral right to talk as if this is applying rules," Varoufakis said.