Greece, Germany face off in last-chance debt talks

Last minute wrangling delayed a make-or-break eurozone meeting yesterday as Greece's demand for a radical easing of its bailout programme ran into German-led opposition to relaxing its austerity commitments.
After days of sharp exchanges, the 19 eurozone finance ministers were due to gather for the third time in little over a week to consider Athens' take-it or leave-it proposal to extend an EU loan programme which expires this month.
"Start (of) Eurogroup rescheduled to 16:30" (15:30 GMT), Dutch Finance Minister and Eurogroup head Jeroen Dijsselbloem said in a tweet.
Dijsselbloem gave no reason for the delay as EU officials continued to try to find the compromise wording needed to get the eurozone off the hook of a Greece-Germany stand-off.
The spokesman for European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker said "we are confident a deal is possible in the forseeable future if everyone is reasonable."
"We are not there yet," added spokesman Margaritis Schinas. Any Eurogroup decision must be unanimous.
German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble on Thursday rejected the Greek request out of hand but a lengthy phone call between Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tspiras and German Chancellor Angela Merkel appeared to calm the waters.

Meeting in Paris Friday with French President Francois Hollande, Merkel said the German position "since the beginning of the Greek programme" had been that Greece remain in the bloc and added that Berlin "would do everything to continue along this path."
For its part, Greece said it would request an EU summit should the Eurogroup meeting fail.
Time is pressing to find a solution before the current bailout programme ends, for fear that failure could see Greece run out of money and be forced out of the eurozone within weeks.
Analysts downplay the likelihood of a "Grexit", saying the eurozone is much stronger now than at the height of the debt crisis in 2011-12.
But the uncertainty weighs heavily at a time when the economy has faltered and governments are desperate to boost growth.