© Reuters/Alexander ZemlianichenkoGreek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.
"The tranche of €448 million has been delivered to the IMF," said the Greek news agency ANA referring to senior sources in the Greek Finance Ministry. The money was transferred despite rumors the country would not manage to do it on time, which could push the country out of the eurozone.
The payment comes as Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is in Moscow on a two-day official visit. On Thursday, he said the main objective of the Greek government is to keep the country in the eurozone and to find a common European solution to its financial problems.
"The purpose of our government is that Greece remained in the eurozone, we are looking for a common European solution to this [debt restructuring - Ed.] problem," Tsipras said, speaking to students at the Moscow State Institute for International Affairs.
Watch Live--Discussion with Russian students at Moscow State Institute of International Relations http://t.co/7cn535asmH #Greece
— Alexis Tsipras (@tsipras_eu) April 9, 2015Eurozone deputy finance ministers have set a six-day deadline for Athens to revise reform proposals in order to increase the possibility of unlocking bailout aid at a Eurogroup meeting on April 24, Greek newspaper Ekathimerini reported on Thursday.
"A deadline of six working days was given to the Greek side to present proposals that can be acceptable by creditors," the paper said.
Athens has already submitted a 26-page reform list criticized by the IMF and the EU negotiators for being too vague and the measures not concrete enough.
Having paid off €448 million in debt to the IMF, Greece has another €768 million falling due in May. Should Greece manages to fulfill these obligations, and the EU approves the reforms proposed by Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis, the Troika of international creditors represented by the IMF, the European Central Bank, and the European Commission, is expected to allocate the next €7.2 billion in aid to Athens and negotiate the restructuring of its external debt by June.
It will take a few months to really tell how determined is the new Greek government to defy IMF, ECB etc. and thus exit Eurozone. For now it seems the strategy is to remain a member of European institutions for a while (which means having to pay €448 million to the International Monetary Fund) for some reason. My guess is Greeks are buying time for the German WW II reparations and debt audit committees to bear fruits before the coming final round of negotiations in June. The first of these committees will claim some 300 billion euros for the deeds of Nazi Germans, and the other will aim to provide the legal arguments to write off some 50% (or more) of current public debt as illegal by international law. The Greek government seems very invested on pursuing the success of these two committees, to the degree that I cannot see how Greece can remain in the Eurozone for much longer than a few months after they both come to a conclusion. Unless EU starts a transformation, and Merkel is willing to take huge steps back from the current hard line policies, which I don't think is very probable.
Also it could be that Greeks are just playing by the book and holding on to their full EU membership in order to maintain their precious veto power, at least until the coming round of European talks concerning present and future Russian sanctions. Although Tsipras has more than a few things to offer Putin in exchange of Russian help and solidarity, I would guess that one thing Putin really appreciates is having his own EU "insider" with veto powers that would break the united European front against Russia.