Eurozone finance ministers seek Greek bailout deal as creditors at impasse

Finance ministers of the 19-country eurozone are set to meet on Tuesday afternoon to seek a deal on the Greek bailout which would unlock a new tranche of funds, while the country's creditors remain at an impasse on Greek debt sustainability.

The ministers' meeting came two days after Greek legislators approved fresh austerity measures including tax hikes and a new privatization fund, in a move to meet creditors' demands and conclude the first review of its bailout program.

Greece is again faced with tough times as it desperately needs the next tranche of a bailout distribution to repay billions of euros in loans to the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in June and July.

The IMF insists that Greece needs "upfront"and "unconditional" debt relief, saying in an assessment on Monday that Greece cannot meet the terms of the bailout program and that interest payments on the soaring national debt would eat up 60 percent of the budget by 2060 without debt forgiveness.

The Washington-based fund analyzed that Greece needed longer time to repay loans, with the interest rate on its loans fixed at 1.5 percent, and its creditors should make debt relief automatic once the bailout program ends in 2018.

The European side, however, holds the view that Athens has done enough to be given the next distribution. Germany believes Greece could meet its austerity targets and stands strongly against any debt relief for Athens.

Last year, international creditors agreed to give Greece an 86-billion-euro (96 billion U.S. dollar) bailout loan to avert its exit from the single currency bloc. Endit