ATHENS (Sputnik) – The meeting was expected to be held on Thursday but Eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem said it was called off because of a lack of progress in talks with Greece.
International lenders want Greece to adopt a package of contingency measures that will be enforced if Athens goes off the track in reducing budget deficit.
The Greek economy has been severely strained for several years, because of the country’s multibillion debt accumulated after the 2008 world economic crisis.
Athens signed a deal with its creditors, which include the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Central Bank (ECB) and Eurozone nations, in the summer of 2015 for a third bailout package worth about 86 billion euros ($96 billion) in exchange for highly unpopular austerity reforms such as pension cuts and tax hikes.
Under two previous bailout programs, the last of which expired on June 30, 2015, Greece received about $270 billion from the IMF, the ECB and eurozone countries. The aid also came in exchange for austerity measures.
