As Greece moved closer toward bankruptcy,
Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras seemed more eager to strike a deal with his international creditors.
Tsipras was finally ready to cut pensions, speed up privatizations and
increase Value Added Tax (VAT) in luxury islands like Mykonos and
Santorin. These proposals would be soon presented to the European Union
(EU) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), media reports said on
Monday.
"We need to find a solution by mid-May," Nikos Filis, parliamentary representative of Tsipras' party Syriza said on Greek radio.
Tsipras was finally ready to negotiate after he spoke with German
Chancellor Angela Merkel and Eurogroup chief Jeroen Dijsselbloem in
separate phone calls on Sunday. He then met Finance Minister Yanis
Varoufakis, causing the media in Greece to speculate that Varoufakis
might eventually be removed from the position of chief negotiator in
Greece's talks with its creditors.
Tsipras' decision could be traced back to a
Eurogroup meeting in Riga last week,
where eurozone finance ministers accused Varoufakis of being a
"gambler" and leading his country in the wrong direction. "They want his
head," said a headline in the Greek daily Ta Nea.
Euclid Tsakalotos, the deputy foreign minister, would henceforth lead
all bailout talks for Greece, Tsipras said. However, Varoufakis would
still remain finance minister, although his close confidante was being
replaced with Nikos Chouliarakis, who has worked with the IMF, the EU
and the European Central Bank before.
Read more: Tsipras ready for reforms, to replace Varoufakis in bailout talks | News | DW.DE | 27.04.2015