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EU leaders ready to help Greece, markets bet on bailout
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EU leaders ready to help Greece, markets bet on bailout
AFP - 24 minutes ago
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Riot police clash with demonstrators in Athens during a protest against the government's austerity plan to solve country's debt crisis, March 2010. European Union leaders said they were ready to help Greece resolve massive debt problems that have shaken the eurozone as the markets bet that a bailout was close despite another ratings downgrade on Athens.
ATHENS (AFP) - – European Union leaders said Friday they were ready to help Greece resolve massive debt problems that have shaken the eurozone as the markets bet that a bailout was close despite another ratings downgrade on Athens.
"The Greek government is courageous and is breaking with the past. We would be ready to intervene if the Greeks ask us to," EU President Herman van Rompuy told interviewers from Le Monde, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, El Pais and De Standaard.
"This aid plan will only be credible once it is put into operation," he said, two weeks after European leaders agreed to secure EU and IMF funding for Greece if it is unable to borrow at a low enough rate on the open markets.
Germany also said that the EU-IMF rescue scheme could be activated quickly but government spokesman Michael Offer again stressed that Greece could solve its problem by focusing on budget cutbacks.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the EU was ready to activate its rescue scheme "at any time to come to Greece's aid" in remarks after talks with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Related article: Greece sinks deeper as loan costs hit record highs
As the news appeared to be going in Greece's favour, Fitch Ratings took a hard line, saying it had downgraded Greece's debt ratings because of the growing challenge the country faces in managing its public finances.
Fitch said it cut Greece's long-term foreign and local currency Issuer Default Ratings to BBB- from BBB+.
"The downgrade reflects the intensification of fiscal challenges in response to more adverse prospects for economic growth and increased interest costs," it said in a statement.
"It also reflects ongoing uncertainties about the government's financing strategy in the context of increased capital market volatility."
Greece has faced increasing difficulties in raising fresh money on financial markets to cover its obligations and ratings downgrades typically will increase a country's borrowing costs.
The yield -- the interest rate paid -- on the Greek benchmark 10-year government bond spiked to a record high above 7.5 percent on Thursday.
But on Friday the rate eased back sharply to 7.096 percent as markets bet that a rescue deal was in the offing after comments from Paris, Berlin and Brussels.
Fitch warned that it was "vital that the Greek authorities import credibility from external institutions, underpinned by a credible commitment of financial support."
At the same time, however, it said the EU-IMF package lacked clarity and this in turn may have made it more difficult for Athens to raise fresh funds.
Fitch and two other leading agencies, Moody's and Standard & Poor's, all downgraded their Greek ratings in December as the country's debt crisis intensified, calling into question the eurzone's credibility as a whole.
Analysts said the way the crisis has evolved and was resolved would have profound implications for the credibility of the European Central Bank and the eurozone it oversees.
On Friday, Van Rompuy pointedly said of the EU-IMF accord that "discussions are under way to fix the technical modalities and make the mechanism concrete."
"The meeting of eurozone finance ministers in mid-April will be able to resolve any outstanding problems."
Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou insisted that the high rates demanded on the country's debt "do not reflect the real situation of the economy or the efforts and results already obtained by the Greek government."
"But with time, I believe that the markets and our European partners will take account of these results."
Greece has to find around 11.5 billion euros by next month to cover its obligations and another 32 billion euros over the balance of the year.
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