Greece needs debt relief because it will not regain access to markets in 2018 unless its public debt is considered sustainable, Bank of Greece governor Yannis Stournaras said on Monday, addressing the annual conference of the Greek Tourism Confederation. Greece should achieve growth rates of 2.7 pct of GDP in 2017, provided the second review of the Greek programme was concluded swiftly.

"The fact that the European Central Bank's (ECB) stress tests showed that Greek systemic banks do not lack capital gives the Greek economy the opportunity to make use of the 11.5 billion euros of the Hellenic Financial Stability Fund (HFSF) with greater ease and flexibility," said on Wednesday Bank of Greece (BoG) governor Yannis Stournaras to newspaper "Ta Nea".

Yiannis Stournaras in his first comments on politics, since taking over as central bank governor last month, said there were still downside risks to the economic outlook. He notes that political uncertainty around a presidential election scheduled for 2015 is the main risk to the debt-laden country's economic recovery.