Greece raises 1.625 billion euros in treasury bills sale

Greece raised 1.625 billion euros in a treasury bills sale on Wednesday, the Public Debt Management Agency (PDMA) announced, as Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was reassuring members of the European Parliament during a speech that Greek people and his government want a fair debt deal and stay in the euro zone.

According to PDMA the interest rate at the auction of the 26-week treasury bills stood at 2.97 percent, unchanged from the previous similar sale of June 10.

Greece has relied on the monthly treasury bills auction program for raising funds for the past year since bailout funding that kept it afloat since 2010 has ceased due to the impasse in negotiations with creditors over the terms of the two sides' future cooperation.

Wednesday's sale was the first taking place after the country was left without the safety net of the bailout that expired on June 30 and in arrears to the International Monetary Fund.

As Greece has been imposing bank closure and capital controls since June 29, euro zone leaders openly warned the government after a summit in Brussels on Tuesday night to submit within 48 hours a credible comprehensive proposal for a debt agreement. Otherwise, Greece faces the prospect that the EU summit in forthcoming Sunday will decide a Grexit, they said.

Addressing the European Parliament on Wednesday Tsipras stressed that Greek voters who turned down the creditors' offer for a deal in the July 5 referendum did not give him a "mandate for rupture with Europe but for a fair and sustainable solution."

Shortly afterwards the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) was receiving the Greek formal request for a new loan program.

Meanwhile, cabinet ministers of his ruling Radical Left SYRIZA party in Athens such as Minister of Productive Reconstruction Panagiotis Lafazanis and Social Insurance Minister Dimitris Stratoulis insisted that the government should not accept a non-viable deal with harsh conditions and that "alternative solutions" existed, pointing to the return to drachma.

Opposition parties leaders who may convene again later on Wednesday with the Premier, according to government sources, strongly criticized him for the developments in Brussels.

"We do not allow him to even consider that he can take a step outside the euro zone without the clear mandate of Greek people," main opposition conservative New Democracy party leader Evangelos Meimarakis said.

Socialist PASOK party leader Fofi Gennimata talked about a "major failure" in Brussels and "secret agendas," while centrist River (Potami) party leader Stavros Theodorakis added that if the government does not submit a proposal to keep Greece in the euro zone, "anything else will be treated as an act of treason by the Greek people".

All three political leaders co-signed on Monday with Tsipras and his junior coalition partner, Panos Kammenos, Defense Minister and leader of the Right- wing Independent Greeks party, a declaration in the presence of the President of the Republic Prokopis Pavlopoulos that Greek people want a solution that will not jeopardize Greece's position in the European Union and the eurozone. Endit