Greece now a "normal" eurozone country, says EU Finance Commissioner Moscovici.
ADVERTISEMENTGreece is now "a normal country in the Eurozone" and does not need financial help from Brussels.
That's according to European Finance Commissioner Pierre Moscovici who was in Athens on Tuesday.
“There is not going to be, there won’t be a fourth program of any kind," he said during a speech to parliament, adding that the so-called "troika" - representatives of the International Monetary Fund, the European Union and the European Central Bank - won't be coming back to Athens to oversee its finances.
Since its 2010 debt crisis, Greece has accepted three international bailouts in exchange for deeply unpopular reforms and painful austerity.
Now Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras wants his country to rely on debt markets without additional external support.
Athens is still set to implement new pension cuts and tax increases next year - even after the bailout ends,
But Moscovici suggested the cuts could be softened:
"'Pacta sunt servanda'" he said at a joint press conference with Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos, "which means commitments must be respected. But commitments are not rigid."
Euronews' Athens correspondent Nicoleta Drougka reports that Moscovici was concerned with more than just debt:
"During the crisis, half a million Greeks, mainly young people, moved abroad for economic reasons. Pierre Moscovici had a special message for them and the families they left behind: the European Commission will not forget them now that the program is completed.
After all, it is a big bet for the Greek government, to bring back the human capital that abandoned the country in the last decade."
