Greek parliament approves bailout deal

(Vatican Radio) The Greek Parliament, in one of the most crucial sessions ever, on Wednesday night comfortably approved an initial batch of reform measures which Greece’s creditors say are needed to get the country back on its economic feet.

Listen to John Carr's report: 

The voting in the 300-seat chamber, after hours of tense debate, was 229 votes in favour, 64 against, and six abstentions. It was another victory for Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who made clear before the vote that he’d regard it as a vote of confidence in his six-month-old government.

But 39 deputies of Tsipras’s own Syriza party defied him and voted against the deal which he had hammered out after a mammoth 17-hour negotiating session with the other eurozone leaders on Monday. Tsipras had acknowledged it was a bad deal, but the best he could do. The terms include a pledge to privatize major state assets, raise taxes and trim pension and social security benefits.

A second round of parliamentary voting is planned for next week to endorse the second instalment of the agreed measures. Tsipras’s victory in the Parliament last night is now expected to release a trickle of funding from the European Central Bank and other agencies, to enable Greece’s banks, shut now for nearly three weeks, to finally reopen.