Greece offers new proposals

Associated Press

ATHENS, Greece

Greece finally met a deadline that counted Thursday, delivering a series of sweeping proposals to its creditors before midnight to set off a mad rush toward a weekend deal to stave off a financial collapse of the nation.

The package raised hopes that Greece can get a rescue deal that will prevent a catastrophic exit from the euro after key creditors said they were open to discussing how to ease the country’s debt load, a long-time sticking point in their talks.

In a significant about-face, the government caved into demands for a new round of austerity measures, including sales-tax hikes and cuts in state spending for pensions that the left-leaning Greek government had long resisted.

In the text of proposals sent by Athens late Thursday, the government conceded to demands it had previously refused to accept – mostly on moving various categories of goods and services to higher sales-tax rates – in exchange for a new 53.5 billion-euro ($59 billion) bailout package.

Many of the proposed reforms were harsher than those roundly rejected by the Greek public in a bailout referendum Sunday. But the government said, in return, it “would seek a commitment from creditors to negotiate ... further measures to restructure the long-term debt.”

After months of foot-dragging despite impending chaos, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras met a midnight deadline with more than an hour to spare. The spokesman for eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem tweeted that it was “important for institutions to consider these [proposals] in their assessment” of the Greek situation.

The government scheduled an emergency vote in parliament late today to win backing for the proposals and said it believed it had the support needed for an endorsement.

Finance officials from the European institutions and the International Monetary Fund were to fine-comb through the proposals today before the 19 eurozone finance ministers assess them Saturday.

In ideal circumstances, a summit of all 28 European Union leaders would be able to approve them Sunday.

Earlier Thursday, Donald Tusk of Poland, who chairs the EU summits, indicated that European officials would make an effort to address Greece’s key request for debt relief.