NEWS

Dragasakis recognizes loan deals, seeks change

One of SYRIZA’s key economic policy makers, Yiannis Dragasakis, said Tuesday that his party recognizes Greece’s loan agreements and public debt but that it is seeking adjustments to both.

“We recognize that the country is bound by loan agreements but we want to review them,” he said at an Economist conference in Athens.

In the same vein, Dragasakis argued that his party wants to contribute “to change within Europe, not its destruction.”

“We acknowledge Greece’s debt but we want to discover how it was created and we are interested in entering negotiations over it,” added the SYRIZA candidate.

Earlier, SYRIZA was forced to clarify that it would not seek an extension to the current bailout, as would-be MP Nadia Valavani had suggested in an interview. “We will ask for a technical extension so we can have an opportunity to renegotiate Greece’s debt and submit our own program of true reforms,” she said in an interview with Athina 984 FM.

Valavani issued a statement later saying that her comments had been misinterpreted. She said that SYRIZA would simply ask for more time to negotiate with European institutions, rather than extending austerity measures.

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