The President of the 19-member Eurogroup, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Monday said he is willing to talk with the new far-left Greek government but stressed that Greeceآ’s debt will not be written off.
"We will talk to them. What's important is that if you want to stay in the Eurozone you have to respect the commitments made so far. We will also see which extra financial support they expect from the EU," he told journalists ahead of a meeting of Eurozone finance ministers in Brussels.
Asked on whether the Eurozone can go ahead without Greece, he replied that he is not going to speculate, and added that the Eurozone is there to support each other when needed.
"We have already done a lot to lift the debt burden for Greece over the last two years, we've always said we will continue to work with them if they commit to what we have agreed with them," he said.
"We've extended the current programme (with Greece) until the end of February, of course it depends on how soon the new government is up and running, but the possibility of a further extension we will discuss today in the Eurogroup but also with the Greek government," he said.
Dijsselbloem, however, stressed that "writing off debt in nominal value, I don't think there is a lot of support for that in the Eurozone".