President has telephone conversations with heads of Troika

President of the Republic of Cyprus Nicos Anastasiades has held telephone conversations with the heads of Cyprus’ international lenders, the Troika.

CNA has learnt that President Anastasiades, who is currently in New York to attend the UN General Assembly, held on Friday three separate telephone conversations with Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Christine Lagarde, President of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, and European Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs and the Euro, Oli Rehn.

The same sources have said that the discussions were held in a positive climate.

Referring to the telephone conversation with Christine Lagarde, the source said that she expressed satisfaction with the progress achieved by Cyprus as regards the implementation of its economic rescue program.

Excluded from international capital markets since April 2011, Cyprus applied for financial assistance from the EU bailout mechanism, as its two largest banks, Bank of Cyprus (BoCY) and Cyprus Popular Bank (CPB) requested state support following mass losses as a result of the Greek sovereign debt haircut.

In late March, 2013 the authorities and the Troika (European Commission, European Central Bank and the IMF) agreed on a €10 billion financial assistance package (of which 1 billion from the IMF), which featured a haircut on uninsured deposits (above 100,000 euro) to recapitalize BoCY, whereas CPB was wound down.