Eurogroup head Juncker to visit Athens August 22

Jean-Claude Juncker, head of the eurozone finance ministers group, will visit Greece on August 22, the office of Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras said Friday.

Greece has been bailed out twice by the European Union and International Monetary Fund, with auditors currently reviewing progress it has made on reforms and economic targets to see if it merits its next aid disbursement.

The EU-IMF auditors are due to hold a final meeting with Greek officials this weekend and then return to the country when spending cuts worth 11.5 billion euros are finalised, a finance ministry source said Thursday.

The budget cuts, applicable in 2013 and 2014, were originally to have been finalised last month but back-to-back elections postponed the decision.

They are necessary to unlock a 31.5-billion-euro ($39-billion) loan disbursement by September, part of the country's latest 130-billion-euro rescue package from the EU, the IMF and the European Central Bank.

Samaras on Wednesday overcame reservations over the new savings from his socialist and moderate leftist coalition partners, who are wary of imposing new cuts on a population struggling after years of austerity.

The semi-state run ANA news agency said Samaras is in turn due to visit Paris and Berlin on August 24 and 25 for talks with French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

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