Athens - Ria Novosti
Greece can meet its financial obligations for another six weeks, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said on Tuesday. \"It is obvious there will be no problems until the middle of November and we can fulfill our budget program,\" Venizelos said during press conference. The European authorities and the IMF have said that they will decide on the next 8 billion euro tranche out of a 100 billion euro bailout by mid-October, fearing that Greece may default on its sovereign debt without this aid in the second half of the month. Many experts have said they expect Greece to default on its obligations in the next 6-12 months. The expectations of Greece\'s default have depressed global equity markets in the past few weeks. Greece is sticking to tight austerity measures, including large redundancies and budget cuts to avoid the default and receive bailout funds form the European Union and the IMF. \"Our target is to persuade markets that we have a totally viable solution,\" Venizelos said.