Greek Lawmakers Approve Terms of Bailout Plan

By SUZANNE DALEY and JAMES KANTERJULY July 15, 2015

ATHENS — After a marathon session that stretched into the early hours of Thursday, Greek lawmakers narrowly approved a package of harsh austerity measures and economic policy changes that were required by its creditors as the terms of a $94 billion bailout package.

In Greece’s through-the-looking-glass politics, the vote was seen as a victory for the country’s prime minister, Alexis Tsipras. He was elected on an anti-austerity platform but strongly urged lawmakers to approve the bailout, even after Greeks voted down a similar deal just over a week ago in a referendum he called for.

That left only the International Monetary Fund’s insistence on debt relief for Greece as the last hurdle to the package, which would head off insolvency, the collapse of the banking system and the country’s exit from the euro.

As lawmakers engaged in a bitter debate throughout the day Wednesday, protesters threw firebombs in the square outside and shouted anti-austerity slogans. But the demonstration, the first since Mr. Tsipras and his Syriza party came to power in January, quieted down rather quickly.
Correction: July 15, 2015

**Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this article included an erroneous conversion of the 86-billion-euro debt package. It equals about $94 billion, not $78.5 billion.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/16/business/international/imf-greece-debt-relief.html?_r=0