Euclid Tsakalotos
© Reuters / Alkis Konstantinidis
Euclid Tsakalotos has been appointed as the new Greek finance minister following the resignation of Yanis Varoufakis, Greek presidency official said. Greek media reported he will be sworn in at an official ceremony at 20:00 local time (17:00 GMT).

Tsakalotos "will be sworn in with the political oath as finance minister," the presidency official told Reuters.

Tsakalotos was previously the deputy foreign minister responsible for international economic relations.

It's not the first time Tsakalotos has taken over from Varoufakis. He was appointed to negotiate with creditors at the end of April when the Syriza government replaced Varoufakis. On the sidelines of the talks the former finance minister was often referred to as 'impossible' do deal with.

Like many others in the leftist ruling party, he is more a professor than a politician. Tsakalotos is a graduate of St Paul's College Oxford, where he studied Economics, Politics and Philosophy, and the University of Sussex in the UK. Most recently he has been Professor at the National University of Athens.

In contrast to Varoufakis, who was an outsider, Tsakalotos has been a member of Syriza for almost a decade.

His appointment is hardly out of the blue. When resigning on Monday, Varoufakis said he hoped Tsakalatos would take over.

"I am leaving and I will see you tomorrow with Mr. Tsakalotos," Varoufakis said on leaving the finance ministry on Monday. When asked whether Tsakalotos would be the new finance minister, Varoufakis said: "I hope so."

Greece and its troika of international creditors - the IMF, the ECB and the European Commission have been negotiating with the Syriza government over a bailout deal since the end of January when it came to power on promises to end the austerity cuts. They have so far failed to find compromise, as the Greek Government doesn't want to accept further pension cuts and increase taxes as much as the creditors insist.

On Tuesday eurozone members will make another attempt to find a solution to the deadlock at an emergency summit where they'll discuss the Greek referendum result. The EU President Donald Tusk and president of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker are expected to talk at a European Parliament session in Strasbourg on July 7 at 13:00 GMT.