EPA/Julien Warnand | Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis holds a news conference at the end of the Eurogroup meeting of finance ministers at the EU Council headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, 11 May 2015. Greece says deal near, again But same old barriers to an agreement with creditors remain.

Greece is one week away from completing a deal to secure the final €7.2 billion of its bailout program — that's the word from Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis. But the optimistic assessment comes as left-wingers in the ruling Syriza party show signs of rebelling, voters lose faith in Syriza and the costs of not reaching a deal continue to escalate.

"I think we are very close," Varoufakis told Greek television. "Let's say (it's a matter of) about a week.”

Despite Varoufakis's comments, the message from Economic Commissioner Pierre Moscovici is unchanged from previous weeks: “We are making substantial progress and progress in substance… But of course we are not there.”

However, pressure is growing.

"I'd say the talks need to speed up, rather than that they are going too fast," German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday. She was echoed by French President François Hollande, who called on negotiations to accelerate to keep Greece in the euro.

If the negotiations get that far, leaders could take up a deal on the sidelines of the Eastern Partnership Summit in Riga on Thursday and Friday.

Greek Labor Minister Panos Skourletis told Greek television that Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’ government will reach a cash-for-reforms deal “in the coming days." Skourletis cited June 5 as a deadline. That is the date of the country’s next €310 million payment to the International Monetary Fund — part of €1.5 billion Greece owes the Fund next month. It is pretty clear that Greece doesn't have the money to pay without outside help.

But the sticking points that have prevented a disbursement of the final bailout funds for the last four months remain evident. Tsipras is still weaving between reform measures demanded by Greece's creditors and breaking with unpopular austerity policies.

"I assure you that if we face a dilemma between paying a creditor who refuses to sign an agreement with us and a pensioner, we will pay the pensioner," he said. "I hope we will be able to pay both."

He also blamed Greece's partners for the cash squeeze, saying, "The lack of liquidity is neither the choice nor the responsibility of the Greek government. It is a tough negotiating tactic of our partners."

Adding to confusion about whether a deal is close or not, Zois Tsolis, a financial journalist for the To Vima newspaper, wrote about a leaked document he characterized as a proposal from European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker to disburse funds to Greece in exchange for a list of reforms. The proposal outlined rising primary surplus targets for Greece’s budget, beginning with 0.75 percent of GDP this year and rising to 3.5 percent in 2017-2018. To achieve these targets, the document presented by To Vima called for reforms including an adjustment to Greece’s VAT system, a review of collective bargaining practices in the Greek labor market, and the preservation of the ENFIA real estate tax, a lucrative levy that Tsipras promised to abolish during his election campaign earlier this year.

This deal notably cuts out the IMF from the disbursements. In exchange for these measures, the document suggests giving Greece €5.2 billion from European partners. The problem is that these funds would not cover the €7 billion in redemptions of bonds held by the ECB in July and August.

“It’s a draft of 20 pages, and it was sent yesterday midday about 12 o‘clock to everybody in the Brussels Group (of Greece and its creditors),” Tsolis told POLITICO. He said a representative for the IMF in Athens called him to stress that the draft was just one of many proposals.

The Commission batted away the report in a statement. “We cannot confirm media allegations that the Commission or its President Jean-Claude Juncker made a proposal on Greece.” The Greek government also downplayed the proposal.

But the worry over what happens in the next weeks continues to grow. According to a University of Macedonia survey collected on Friday, for the first time since Syriza took office a majority of Greeks believe the government has taken the wrong strategy in negotiations with its creditors.

In a sign of the political pressure on the Greek leader, hard-liners from the extreme left of Syriza published an editorial Monday denouncing Tsipras over his willingness to compromise. The faction said a break with the euro — something everyone involved in the talks says they don't want — might be the only option. "Syriza can’t become a party of austerity,” the group said. "Our only choice is a rupture with the creditors — suspending loan repayments, (bringing) measures to restrict free movement of capital, putting banks under state control, taxing capital and the wealthy to finance measures to support ordinary people."

The costs of the standoff are rising. Every day that passes without a deal costs the Greek economy €22.3 million and more than 600 jobs, according to a report published by the Hellenic Confederation of Commerce and Enterprises.