Mitsotakis, troika inch toward deal, to meet again [UPDATE]
After a four-hour meeting between Administrative Reform Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and troika envoys on Friday, ministry officials said that no definitive
agreement had been reached on the planned overhaul of the civil service but that negotiations were held «in a good climate» and that fresh talks would be held in the late afternoon or in the early morning.
According to sources, Greek officials have proposed that 3,500 municipal police officers be transferred to the broader ranks of the Greek Police force and 7,500 teachers be transferred to other teaching posts. It remained unclear how the troika had responded to the proposal.
A group of around 50 local authority workers staged a small but vehement protest outside the ministry offices in Athens but there were no clashes with police.
Finance Minister Yannis Stournaras, who met earlier on Friday with troika envoys and Bank of Greece, Giorgos Provopoulos, for talks that centered on developments regarding the recapitalization of Greek banks was to receive the foreign envoys again for talks at 5 p.m. Apart from discussing the progress in negotiations regarding the streamlining of the civil service, Stournaras and the mission chiefs are expected to return to the issue of Greece’s funding gap for 2013 which is in excess of 1 billion euros.
According to sources, Stournaras will suggest alternative measures for covering a funding gap in a bid to avoid burdening Greek businesses with paying a contribution toward the self-employed.
