Van rompuy encourages the greeks – troika in athens

Van rompuy buried greeks’ efforts to consolidate their economy and urged athens to continue its austerity efforts. "The greek people have made significant steps forward. But efforts must continue with further reforms," van rompuy said after a meeting with greek head of government antonis samaras.

With the implementation of the austerity pact, greece will soon have a "robust economy and administration". "I have no doubt that greece’s future is in the eurozone," said van rompuy. But the prerequisite, he said, was that the reforms were realized.

Greek prime minister samaras assured the belgian that greece will fulfill its duties. Samaras, however, made it clear that the country urgently needs growth. The unemployment problem (24.4 percent) has now reached "explosive dimensions," samaras said. "The endurance of the greeks (to save) has reached its limit," samaras added.

According to samaras, it is now urgent to boost the greek economy. This has become "more realistic" after the decision of the european central bank on thursday to buy unlimited government bonds of euro-crisis countries under certain conditions, samaras said.

On friday, the leadership of the international monetary troika of the european union, the european central bank and the international sovereign wealth fund also traveled to athens. The inspectors will meet with finance minister ioannis stournaras and greek head of government samaras in the coming days. The focus of the inspections will be greece’s more than 11.5 billion euro austerity program for 2013 and 2014.

According to the information available so far, it is mainly pensioners and state employees who will bear the brunt of the new cuts. The unions already announced the first demonstrations for saturday evening. Further aid for greece depends on the implementation of this austerity program. Troika report due by end of september or early october.