Greece Fears Cash Will Run Out In Two Weeks

The Greek finance minister has admitted his country may have only enough cash to meet its financial commitments for a "couple of weeks".

Yanis Varoufakis was speaking after a meeting of his eurozone counterparts in Brussels as Greece confirmed it had scraped together enough money to make an International Monetary Fund (IMF) repayment of €750m due on Tuesday.

An emergency account held at the IMF by Greece was used to meet the bill.

The country has been unable to shake off worries about its liquidity because of the failure to unlock €7.2bn being withheld by creditors who want financial reforms in return for the aid.

A default could send Greece crashing out of the euro and the IMF admitted on Monday it was working with countries on contingency plans for such an eventuality.

There is still much work to do on achieving a deal following more than three months of often tortuous negotiations but the Greek anti-austerity government seems to have made enough progress to keep the prospect of agreement alive.

Greece won limited support from the eurozone following Monday's talks but finance ministers insisted Athens could not hope for any of the final €7.2bn due from its bailout funds until it agreed key reforms, including cuts to pensions

The eurogroup statement said: "We welcomed the progress that has been achieved so far... At the same time, we acknowledged that more time and effort are needed to bridge the gaps on the remaining open issues".

Mr Varoufakis said: "The liquidity issue is a terribly urgent issue. It's common knowledge, let's not beat around the bush.

"From the perspective (of timing), we are talking about the next couple of weeks."

Greece is running out of time.

It faces a punishing debt repayment schedule in the coming weeks, owing another €1.5bn to the IMF in June and then another €3bn to the European Central Bank (ECB) in July and August.

Athens has been squeezing funds from the central and local governments to be able to meet its payments.