After almost a decade, the world’s lender of last resort is ready to leave Greece for good.
For a while there, Europe’s most indebted nation had everyone worried that the Mediterranean holiday destination was going to bring on the collapse of the euro. Its ups and downs had the market gyrating. Then came the biggest bailout in global financial history.
The IMF led the effort to save Greece from itself.
At the beginning of the 10-year crisis in Greece, the Washington-based institution had asked for a restructuring of country’s debt.
There was a protracted and painful debate about the merits of austerity that mutated into game of brinkmanship that brought Greece to the very edge of the cliff.
The Greeks loathed the IMF. It was one of the “bad guys” in the so-called troika of lenders that included the European Central Bank and the EU’s executive arm, the European Commission. Its presence was physical in the shape of a permanent office in central Athens.
Now, as the world’s attention turns to another geopolitical crisis, the IMF is finally ready to pack its bags.
The decision was announced as new Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis visited Washington. A former banker, he came to power by ousting former Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras, the man who took on the EU and lost.
‘NEW CHAPTER’
“We look forward to a whole new chapter in our relationship, a relationship of positive cooperation,” Mitsotakis told reporters on Monday after meeting with the IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva, herself relatively new to the job.
It marks a degree of closure to a relationship that has rarely been easy.
Last year, Greece repaid a slice of the money owed sooner than scheduled. The government plans to repay upfront more of the IMF loans this year, in an attempt to prove that the crisis is over — for good.
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