Greek PM defends "emergency" plan for potential eurozone exit

[ATHENS] Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday confirmed he authorized his former finance minister to prepare contingency plans in case the country was forced to leave the euro, calling it the obligation of a responsible government.

"We didn't design or have a plan to pull the country out of the euro, but we did have emergency plans," Mr Tsipras told parliament. "If our partners and lenders had prepared a Grexit plan, shouldn't we as a government have prepared our defence?"

Former Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis this week provoked shock in Greece by confirming he had made secret preparations to hack into citizens' tax codes to create a parallel payment system in case Greece was forced to leave the euro.

REUTERS

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