Chairman of Eurogroup hopeful about extending maturity of loans
The Chairman of the Eurogroup of Finance Ministers has said he is hopeful that a new deal will be done tomorrow to give Ireland more time to pay back its bailout loans.
But speaking to reporters in Cork, Jeroen Dijsselbloem played down concerns that the German Parliament would seek to veto, or amend any agreement.
The Troika has proposed a seven year extension of the repayment dates on Ireland's loans in a bid to make it easier for the country to exit the bailout deal, and return to the markets this year.
Minister Djisselbloem said he hopes the concession can be agreed tomorrow.
"We need to smooth the way and extending the maturities would help that," he said.
"We talked about it briefly twice in the Eurogroup, both times concluding that there was a positive attitude towards this request and hopefully we can tomorrow come to an agreement on the terms."
