RIGA: Greece’s European creditors sought to douse talk that they are making plans for a potential Greek exit from the euro and expressed hope on Saturday that recent criticism may prompt the country to push ahead with an economic reform plan needed to unlock rescue loans.

In the Latvian capital of Riga, the eurozone’s top official, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, said he hoped “some extra urgency” will be injected into the process following the “critical” meeting of the eurozone’s 19 finance ministers the day before.

Greece’s Yanis Varoufakis was rebuked for failing to come up with a list of economic reforms, which are needed so Greece can get money it needs to stay solvent and avoid a potential exit from the euro.

“But it is going to take a couple of days at least,” Dijsselbloem said.

Just two months ago, Greece secured an agreement from the eurozone to get the remaining money in its bailout fund — 7.2 billion euros ($7.7bn) — but only if it came up with mutually agreed reforms.

But with days to go, Athens has yet to present a full list, prompting Friday’s criticism of Varoufakis and the effective abandonment of the deadline.

“Yesterday, we spoke of an A plan, of ‘the’ plan, because there is no plan B, C, D, or E,” said French Finance Minister Michel Sapin.

“There is only one plan, and that’s Greece in the euro, Greece in Europe.”

Wolfgang Schaeuble, Germany’s finance minister, said it doesn’t make any sense to engage in talk of a plan B but noted that history has a way of working out in a surprising manner.

He even harked back to 1989 when any talk about German reunification would have been considered “crazy” — within a year of the fall of the Berlin Wall, Germany was reunified in October 1990.

Though acknowledging “anxiety” among his peers, Varoufakis has sought to portray the impasse more positively, noting progress on issues such as privatization, reforming the tax system, judiciary and bureaucracy.

Published in Dawn, April 26th, 2015

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