WikiLeaks quotes two Fund officials discussing walking away from Greek bailout without a debt relief deal.
By PAUL DALLISON
The International Monetary Fund could walk away from the team overseeing the latest Greek bailout, and fears the Brexit debate will paralyze the EU at a crucial time for Greece, according to a leaked transcript of a conversation between two senior Fund officials.
WikiLeaks obtained details of a discussion last month between the two IMF officials in charge of managing the Greek debt crisis — Poul Thomsen, head of the IMF’s European department, and Delia Velculescu, the IMF mission chief for Greece.
According to the transcript, the IMF was planning to tell Germany that it will quit the troika (the IMF, the European Commission and the European Central Bank) if no agreement can be reached on Greek debt relief, which it believes is essential to avoid a Greek default.
It says Germany is under pressure because of the migration crisis and suggests confronting Chancellor Angela Merkel over debt relief and warning her that the IMF could walk away from the bailout.
The transcript quotes Thomsen as saying: “Ms. Merkel, you face a question, you have to think about what is more costly: to go ahead without the IMF? … Or [does Merkel] pick the debt relief that we think that Greece needs in order to keep us on board?”
The IMF pair also want to move quickly on debt relief because they fear that the U.K. referendum on June 23 will freeze EU decision-making.
“Clearly the Europeans are not going to have any discussions for a month before the Brexits [sic] and so, at some stage they will want to take a break and then they want to start again after the European referendum,” Thomsen says, according to the transcript.
