Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalaotos and Economy Minister Giorgos Stathakis are expected to meet with IMF head Christine Lagarde and Poul Thomsen on Friday at IMF-World Bank meeting which starts today. Greek Ministers will meet tomorrow with Eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem and probably with German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble.

However, during a press conference held on Thursday ahead of the meeting, Mrs. Lagarde claimed that Greece’s economy could be salvaged, if the country’s debt was sustainable and it accelerated the necessary reforms.

She also added that Greece cannot withstand many additional new measures in the coming years and the goal must be a debt relief.

“There has to be a combination of the right measures and correct fiscal policies. The goal should be to render the debt sustainable”, said Mrs Lagarde, while responding to a question on whether Greece could reach a 3.5% primary surplus in GDP, she said that if Greece “made absolutely heroic efforts” it could be achieved.

“I don’t see any flexibility on the 3.5 percent in 2018 because it was one of the anchors of the agreement of last summer. So that’s going to take a huge effort on the part of Greece but I think it can be done,” Mr. Dijsselbloem said.

He also said that Europeans will examine a possible Greek debt relief, adding though that “the IMF is right, how can we be sure on what will be done in the next 10, 20, 30 years. So the question is how to deal with the uncertainty around that, what do we do ‘if””.

However, nobody talks about “debt haircut” anymore. After saying that fiscal targets of the Greek program are not realistic, Mrs. Lagarde argued that the IMF is open to a possible extension of the schedule of loans and bonds repayment, or lowering interest rates, but she did not make any reference to any debt haircut.