French PM: Give Greece More Time to 'Pull Through'

French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said in an interview aired Sunday that he was in favour of giving Greece more time to pull through the eurozone crisis as long as it was sincere in taking on reforms.

He said in the interview with the French Mediapart website that "the solution cannot be Greece's exit from the eurozone," adding that "We can already give it more time to pull through."

Asked whether he was in favour of granting the debt-ridden country more time, he said, "Yes. On one condition, that Greece be sincere in implementing reforms, including fiscal ones."

Ayrault said he had talked to Greek socialist leader Evangelos Venizelos in August about the country's sincerity, adding that "the Greeks are stumbling over their fiscal reforms at the moment.

"Those who have a lot of money in Greece invest in housing abroad. It's all immoral. The Greek crisis is structural, but also political," Ayrault concluded.

Greece and its international creditors are currently in talks to identify 11.5 billion euros ($15 billion) in savings and a further 2.0 billion euros in increased revenue that are necessary to unlock a new EU-IMF loan instalment of 31 billion euros.