REUTERS

BRUSSELS GREECE’S entire schedule of emergency loans from the European Union and International Monetary Fund is being pushed back by three months because of a delay in the payout of a tranche in 2011, the European Commission said on Thursday.

The next 5 billion euro (4.1 billion pound) tranche for Greece that was originally scheduled to be paid in December 2011 is now to be paid out in March 2012, Commission spokesman Olivier Bailly said.

A further 10 billion euros that Greece was originally to receive in March this year, will now be paid only in June and all of those sums can also be delayed if inspectors judge Athens is failing to deliver promised fiscal reforms.

“That cannot be changed,” Bailly said, referring to the three month rhythm in paying out tranches of the first Greek rescue programme.

Last year, Athens repeatedly said it faced the risk of defaulting if the EU and IMF did not pay out scheduled tranches. Europe’s political leaders have made it clear that as long as Greece meets criteria on reforms, it will be financed as necessary by the EU and IMF, but investors with money in Greek bonds are watching its cashflow closely.

The payouts are part of the aid that Athens has been promised under a 110 billion joint EU/IMF financing programme in 2010 in exchange for fiscal austerity and structural reforms that are to make public finances of the highly indebted country sustainable.

Out of the total, 73 billion euros have already been paid, and 37 billion remain to be disbursed.

The delay in the payout of the money last year, which meant 8 billion euros from September were only paid out in December, was caused by Greece’s failure to keep up with its commitments to implement austerity and structural reforms.

Bailly said that if Greece fails to meet the aid conditions again, more delays in pay-outs would follow. A team of EU and IMF inspectors will visit Greece on January 14-16 to verify reform progress.

“If our mission in mid- January concludes that there is a delay in progress, we would have to review March (payment due then),” Bailly said.