French President Emmanuel Macron has called for the creation of a new European Monetary Fund to handle European financial affairs in future.
Asking that International Monetary Fund should take a back seat following the ill fated participation in the Greek bailout,"The presence of the IMF was a symptom of the lack of trust between European states, between European institutions and the member states,IMF, which participated in the Greek bailout due to pressure from Germany, "had no place in EU affairs and therefore reform of Eurozone institutions is needed that would entail the creation of a new European Monetary Fund",Sputnik quoted Macron as saying after a meeting with Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.
The Greek debt crisis started in late 2009, triggered by the turmoil of the Great Recession, structural weaknesses in the Greek economy.The IMF's lending rules stipulated that it would only issue loans to countries which were able to repay their debts, and its resources were mainly used by smaller, developing economies. The IMF therefore became part of Greece's "Troika" of creditors, along with the European Commission and the European Central Bank, provided about 260 billion euros ($312.86 billion)to Greece since 2010, but the IMF has so refused for the third bailout unless European leaders commit to a formal restructuring of Greece's debt.
Any default on Greek debt will therefore scuttle changes of further loan for a Greek bailout from IMF.
French economist Philippe Bechade told Sputnik that "in theory, Europe is not a region in a difficult situation," and should be able to resolve its own financial difficulties without assistance from the IMF.
"Initially, the sum being talked about was 50 billion Euros, which could have been quickly resolved. Germany in principle did not want to do this because it thought that German taxpayers should not have to pay for the stupidity of Greece," Bechade said.
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