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BRUSSELS — Greece on Monday agreed to compromise on new bailout reforms in a bid to break a deadlock with its EU- International Monetary Fund (IMF) creditors that has sparked fears of a new Grexit crisis.

Officials representing the lenders will return to Athens shortly for talks on new measures, Eurogroup chief Jeroen Dijssebloem said after talks in Brussels.

Austerity-hit Greece's eurozone and the IMF lenders have been locked for months in a standoff over debt relief and budget targets.

"I'm very happy with that outcome today," Dijsselbloem, the Dutchman who heads the Eurogroup of 19 eurozone finance ministers, told a press conference.

"They will work with the Greek authorities on an additional package of structural reforms of the tax system, pension system and labour market regulation."

Creditor officials left Athens in December after failing to sign off on the second review of Greece's bailout and freeing up new funds.

Dijsselbloem said they will now return "in the very short term".

Markets have been spooked by fears of a return of the "Grexit" crisis, with Athens at risk of default this summer if it cannot unlock the latest tranche of the huge 86-billion-euro ($91 billion) bailout agreed in 2015.

Fears are that a long series of elections, starting with the Netherlands in March and France in April, could delay matters dangerously.

'Not one euro more'

 
Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos approved measures that will be automatically triggered if Athens fails to meet budget targets, European sources told AFP.

"The Greek side agrees to legislate the reforms which will take effect from 2019," a Greek government source said on condition of anonymity.

But the deal will include an "inviolable" clause that there will not be "one single euro more of austerity", the Greek source said.

The measures must still be approved by the Greek parliament, most likely in mid-March, a step that has caused problems in previous deals.

Germany's powerful Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said he was confident the IMF would continue to participate in the bailout.

"I am working on the principle that the [creditor] institutions now have a common position," Schaeuble said ahead of the meeting,.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel meets International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde and European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker in Berlin on Wednesday, in hopes of making further progress.

The Europeans have been at loggerheads with the IMF over the Washington-based lender's demands for easier budget targets and for Athens' mountain of debt to be reduced.

The IMF insists that budget targets demanded of Greece by the Europeans are too ambitious.

But if the eurozone is going to stick with its plans, then the IMF has demanded what it sees as the necessary tax hikes and pension cuts to meet them before it will lend further to Athens.

Greece, led by leftist premier Alexis Tsipras, refuses the further tightening of the screws, calling it an unfair addition to what he has already delivered.

Meanwhile, eurozone hardliners led by Schaeuble refuse to back down on the IMF's call for debt relief, while insisting at the same time that the IMF stay on board with the bailout.

"It's a very tough negotiation," said a negotiator on condition of anonymity.

Difficult elections

The stakes could hardly be higher as the last such crisis, which followed Tsipras's election, nearly saw Athens expelled from the euro.

A possible default by Athens is still some months off but it needs enough money to repay seven billion euros in debt in July.

The elections in Europe are adding to the pressure, with Dijssebloem himself at risk of losing his job if the polls are right about his party's position.

Anti-EU candidates are leading polls in those elections and officials worry that Greece's future could get ensnared in the campaigning. 

Delays in the talks have worried already jittery markets. 

Greece's two-year borrowing rates have risen as high as 10 per cent in recent weeks while France has also come under some pressure as investors seek safety in German assets.

AMMAN — Royal Jordanian (RJ) on Monday announced its new connecting flights from London Heathrow to Aqaba, where Jordan’s second international airport is situated, via the capital Amman, according to an RJ statement.

The step is “to provide a more convenient connection time in Queen Alia International Airport for the passengers travelling onboard RJ from London Heathrow to Aqaba”, the statement said. This operation will be run on Saturdays.

The daily scheduled flight from London Heathrow Airport to Amman’s Queen Alia International Airport takes off at 16:05 and lands in Amman at 23:05; passengers can then fly to Aqaba on Saturday at 1:15am and arrive there at 2:10 am. This operation will take place between March 31and June 30, 2017, and from September 15 to December 31, 2017.  

CAIRO — Tourists are slowly returning to Egypt, easing pressure on a key sector battered by years of turmoil and the 2015 bombing of a plane carrying Russian holidaymakers.

"There is an increase in the number of tourists. This situation was much better in January than in previous years," Tourism Ministry spokeswoman Omaima Al Husseini said.

Visitors from China, Japan and Ukraine account for a large part of the growth. 

China's top public travel agency, China International Travel Service, reported a 58 per cent increase in tourists flying to Egypt compared with 2015.

"There are more bookings between October 2016 and January 2017 than last year," said Egyptian Federation of Tourism chief Karim Mohsen.

"There is an improvement, especially in cultural tourism in Cairo, Luxor and Aswan," key historical sites, he said.

The uptick is a sign of hope for a country also reeling from the shock of an economic reform programme that has triggered massive inflation.

Once a key foreign currency earner, the tourism sector crashed in 2011 after a popular uprising overthrew veteran strongman Hosni Mubarak, ushering in years of sporadic unrest.

Recoveries in the sector since then have been set back by new crises.

In June 2015, a massacre of tourists at a Luxor temple was narrowly averted when assailants armed with assault rifles and explosives bungled the attack and were intercepted by police.

But in October that year, militants, who are waging an insurgency in the eastern Sinai Peninsula, struck again. They bombed a Russian airliner carrying holidaymakers home from the popular Red Sea resort of Sharm El Sheikh.

All 224 people on board were killed.

Russia suspended flights to Egypt and Britain cut air links with Sharm El Sheikh.

Visitor numbers plunged from 9.3 million in 2015 to 5.3 million the following year, Husseini said.

Recovery hinges on Russia, UK 

But industry officials have cautiously welcomed what they say is a noticeable improvement since October.

In December 2016, 551,600 tourists visited Egypt compared with 440,000 the year before, according to the government's statistics agency.

"Activity has picked up a bit in the winter of 2016-2017," said Tamer Al Shaer, vice president of the Blue Sky travel agency.

He said that included a 30 per cent increase in Ukrainian tourists and a 60 per cent increase in visitors from China, with daily flights to Aswan, a southern city rich in ancient sites.

Japan's HIS travel agency said the number of tourists heading to Egypt "multiplied by four to five times" last year.

Since charter flights from Japan to Egypt resumed in April 2016, they have been on average 80 per cent full, said a spokesman for the Japan Association of Travel agents.

Egypt hosted a record 14.7 million foreign tourists in 2010, a year before Mubarak's overthrow and the ensuing economic nosedive.

Restoring even two thirds of that number is a key government goal, but it hinges on Russia and Britain resuming flights, Husseini said.

"There are ongoing negotiations... we hope the issue will be resolved as soon as possible," she said.

More than 60 per cent of tourists arriving in Sharm El Sheikh by plane used to come from Britain or Russia.

"So long as the Russians do not come back, there will be paralysis," Mohsen said. "Russians and Britons are the backbone of Sharm El Sheikh."

Other European countries such as Germany and France have registered a slight increase in reservations to Egypt.

In early February, four other European countries — Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden — eased travel warnings against travel to south Sinai, where Sharm El Sheikh and other resorts are situated.

CAIRO — Egypt's agricultural exporters are seeing a surge in demand and finding new foreign markets only months after the currency was floated, with many rushing to expand capacity to keep up.

Egypt's pound has roughly halved in value since the central bank abandoned its peg of 8.8 to the dollar on November 3, making Egyptian fruit and vegetables look cheap and attractive to foreign buyers, exporters said.

"Demand has doubled, with every product gaining one or two markets," said Mostafa Al Naggari, chairman of Fresh Fruit Co., which recently signed deals to ship to China and is finalising others with Australia, New Zealand and Korea.

The currency flotation helped Egypt to secure a $12 billion IMF loan to support a wide-ranging reform programme aimed at restoring foreign inflows and reining in the budget deficit.

A series of tax increases and subsidy cuts, along with the currency depreciation, have driven inflation to record levels in a country where millions live a pay cheque away from hunger. But amid the pain of government austerity, local manufacturers and exporters are reporting a pick up in activity.

Egyptian politicians have blamed the import-dependent country's ballooning trade deficit, which stood at $42.64 billion in 2016, for putting pressure on the pound. Along with a sharp reduction in imports, a rise in agricultural exports could help narrow that gap.

Exports of Egyptian vegetables, fruits and legumes amounted to $2.2 billion last year and would likely rise by about 15 per cent in 2017 as a result of the float, Abdel Hamid Al Demerdash, the head of Egypt's Agriculture Export Council, said.

The main vegetable exports include onions and artichokes, and fruits include oranges and strawberries.

The growing interest follows a turbulent year for Egyptian produce, with a Hepatitis A scare in North America linked to Egyptian strawberries and a temporary ban of Egyptian fruits and vegetables in Russia, one of Cairo's top buyers.

But traders say growth now comes down to how quickly they can expand to meet demand.

Japan Food Solutions (JFS), a fruit and vegetable exporter, is working to double its planted area this year to meet an expected 20-30 per cent increase in demand on the back of new orders from markets in Europe and North America, senior managing director Emad Said said.

"I see this as a golden opportunity for Egyptian produce to compete more aggressively ... The clever ones will seize this opportunity to enter new markets," he said.

PICO Modern Agriculture Co., another exporter, has seen its demand from Gulf Arab countries jump by about 50 per cent in the last two months, chief executive Alaa Diab said.

"The flotation has been very tempting and very helpful. It opened the eyes of many importers to come look at Egypt where they can get much more competitive deals," Diab said.

ATHENS — Greece said Thursday it intends to reach “a political agreement in principle” with its creditors on Monday, in order to unblock loans required by the cash-strapped country to repay its debts.

For months, Athens and its European and International Monetary Fund (IMF) lenders have failed to concur over the terms of the latest review of Greece’s 86 billion euro bailout.

Eurozone finance ministers meet on Monday in Brussels to discuss the deadlock with hopes that the different sides can at least achieve an outline of a deal. 

This is the aim of “all the stakeholders” in Greece’s recovery programme, government spokesman Dimtris Tzanakopoulos told a press conference.

“The political conditions are there for such an agreement,” he said.

A senior eurozone official in Brussels said that a broad sketch of a deal was the “best case scenario” for the ministerial talks on Monday.

This would allow the creditors to send teams to Athens in order to “crunch the numbers” and hammer out the final deal, the official said.

The row is centred on whether Greece can deliver on budget targets that the IMF says are based on overly-optimistic economic forecasts.

The eurozone has demanded that Greece deliver a primary balance, or budget surplus before debt repayments, of 3.5 per cent of GDP, but the IMF has said only 1.5 per cent is feasible.

The Washington-based fund insists more tax hikes and pension cuts are needed for Greece to meet its targets — something the leftist government in Athens flatly refuses.

A compromise is required to sign off on a second review of the bailout programme and unblock a tranche of loans Greece needs for debt repayments of seven billion euros this summer.

According to Tzanakopoulos, the challenge for Monday’s meeting is to “bridge the differences” in the post-2018 forecasts between Greece and Europe on the one hand and the IMF on the other.

European Commission Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis warned that “time lost in reaching an agreement will have a cost for everyone”.

“The agreement is within reach, provided that all sides show political will,” he told Greek economic portal Euro2day.

Top EU economics official Pierre Moscovici, considered an ally of Greece, visited Athens on Wednesday in a bid to end the standoff.

“We have a few key days, let’s concentrate now to finish all these talks. The parameters are on the table, everybody knows them,” he told reporters.

AMMAN — Royal Jordanian (RJ) and Turkish Airlines Technic, Inc. sealed an agreement, whereby RJ will receive Line Replaceable Units (LRU) components pool support and spares for V2500 engines installed on RJ’s A320 family aircraft.

The services and spares that will be provided within the framework of the agreement will be based in Turkish Technic’s Istanbul base and supply stations throughout the world.

The contract will serve to enhance the business relationship between the two parties and will be a sustainable step for Turkish Technic in the Middle East region. Stressing the trust in the services provided by Turkish Technic, Royal Jordanian President/CEO Suleiman Obeidat said: “We are pleased to cooperate with a pioneer MRO company in the region, Turkish Technic.

We believe their contributions and technical services will back our endeavors to provide a continued on-time, efficient operation, all for an enhanced passenger satisfaction.” Turkish Technic has reached a fleet size of about 800 aircraft in the component pool market with the signing of this agreement.

Tokyo — Tokyo stocks jumped on a weak yen Wednesday as Federal Reserve boss Janet Yellen signalled that US interest rates could rise at any time, but Toshiba tumbled again as it warned of massive losses.

Yellen presented an upbeat view of the world's largest economy in her testimony to Congress, noting labour market conditions continue to improve and inflation is inching up to the Fed's 2 per cent target.

She confirmed another rate increase was on the way, which leaves open the possibility of a move at the March 14-15 policy meeting.

That propelled the dollar to 114.35 yen from 114.27 yen in New York and sharply up from the 113.40 yen in Tokyo earlier Tuesday. 

A weaker yen is good news for Japan's exporters as it makes their products more competitive overseas and inflates repatriated profits.

Tokyo's benchmark Nikkei 225 index rose 1.03 per cent, or 199 points, to close at 19,437.98, while the Topix index of all first-section issues finished 0.95 per cent, or 14.57 points, higher at 1,553.69.

Wall Street's three main indexes set records for a fourth straight session Tuesday after President Donald Trump's promise last week to unveil "phenomenal" US tax reforms soon.

"In principle, the Trump rally continues," said Toshihiko Matsuno, chief strategist at SMBC Friend Securities. 

"Yellen seemed so positive" towards hiking interest rates, he told AFP.

Mobile carrier SoftBank jumped 1.58 per cent to 8,670 yen after it announced it will buy US asset-management firm Fortress Investment Group for $3.3 billion in cash.

Toyota tacked on 0.57 per cent to 6,491 yen while camera and copier maker Canon rose 1 per cent to 3,323 yen.

Toshiba sank 8.74 per cent to 209.7 yen, extending Tuesday's 8 per cent selloff. The drop was sparked by growing fears about the firm's finances as it issued a grim preliminary earnings forecast Tuesday.

The company said it was on track for a net loss of 390 billion yen in the fiscal year to March, hit by a writedown topping 700 billion yen at US nuclear division Westinghouse Electric.

Toshiba's chairman quit his post as it delayed the release of formal financial results and also revealed it was investigating possible misconduct by senior executives at the division.

A whistleblower had complained top executives had exerted "inappropriate pressure" over accounting at the US firm, Toshiba said.

The revelation comes less than two years after Toshiba — one of Japan's best-known companies — was hammered by an embarrassing profit-padding scandal.

AMMAN — Prime Minister Hani Mulki on Tuesday stressed the importance of considering alternative routes and working out ways deemed appropriate to facilitate the flow of goods between Jordan and Turkey, according to the Jordan News Agency, Petra. 

 The premier made the remark during a meeting with a Turkish delegation, chaired by President of the Turkish Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges Rifat Hisarciklioglu, currently on a visit to the Kingdom.

Mulki said through using alternative crossing points, Jordan and Turkey can increase their joint commercial exchange volume. Turkey may also benefit from the various investment opportunities available in the Kingdom and at Aqaba Special Economic Zone, in particular, the premier told the visiting delegation, stressing the strong relations between both countries.  

In April 2015 because of the Syrian conflict, Jordan had to close Jaber crossing which served as a major trade route, providing an outlet for Jordanian goods and a conduit for inter-regional trade between Turkey, Europe and the Gulf Cooperation Counties, according to news websites.

Mulki also expressed hope that the Jordanian-Turkish free trade agreement, which came into force in 2011, could contribute to increasing trade exchange and investments. He also highlighted other free trade agreements that Jordan signed with other countries, encouraging Turkish investors to benefit from them.

Commending the ongoing reform process in Jordan, Oglu noted that the two countries have similar challenges, in terms of their geopolitical position.

He pointed out that his accompanying delegation comprises 50 businessmen, representing leading Turkish companies who are interested in boosting joint Jordanian-Turkish investments. 

The meeting was attended by several Jordanian ministers and representatives of business entities, as well as Turkey’s Ambassador to Jordan Murat Karagöz.

DOHA — Hundreds of drivers with ride-hailing service Uber in Qatar went on strike on Monday for the second time in a year to protest against fare cuts.

The US-based company, which started operations in Doha in 2014, has in recent months cut fares by 15-20 per cent for passengers amid growing competition from local firms.

Uber drivers in Doha stayed home on Monday to protest the cuts and an "upfront" service launched by Uber in November that allows passengers to view the total fare before their journey.

"The upfront isn't fair. If you get stuck in traffic or the passenger makes extra stops during the journey, we receive nothing for that," said John, an Ethiopian driver who declined to give his second name.

"If they don't raise fares and treat drivers better we have many other platforms we can go to. I have a family to support," he said.

Uber has tried to drive down taxi fares to win customers from local rivals in Qatar like Careem which has a larger market share than Uber in most of the 32 cities in the Middle East, North Africa and Pakistan region in which it operates.

An Uber spokesman in Dubai said the company was "committed to dialogue with partner drivers" and had made improving their experience a priority.

"We are very proud of the high quality service they offer to riders who want to get around Doha with a safe, efficient and affordable ride," said the spokesman in a statement.

Thousands of Ethiopians, Indians and Nepalis work as Uber drivers in wealthy Qatar where unions and labour protests are banned and authorities penalise dissent with jail terms or immediate deportation.

Some drivers say they have struggled since an oil slump in mid-2014 that has squeezed state finances and last year saw Doha raise the domestic price of gasoline by 30 per cent.

CAIRO — Egyptian chocolate spread maker Swifax has doubled its sales and is struggling to keep up with demand since the pound currency dived in November, forcing shoppers traditionally "obsessed with everything foreign", to ditch pricy imports and buy local.

"People started changing their habits," Swifax's Commercial Director Mohamed El Gammal told Reuters. "We could sell even more ... but we have a problem with our capacity."

The pound's flotation and an ensuing increase in tariffs on more than 300 products shipped from abroad have hit importers hard, but have been a boon for domestic manufacturers such as Swifax.

Once shunned in favour of prestigious foreign brands perceived to offer higher quality, Egyptian-made products are much more affordable for customers who are increasingly price conscious as inflation has shot above 28 per cent.

The bonanza began when Egypt abandoned its peg of 8.8 pounds to the dollar on November 3. Since then, the currency has roughly halved in value to around 17.75.

Sitting in his office next to a glass cabinet crammed with varieties of the sandwich-filler popular with sweet-toothed Egyptians, Gammal said sales have jumped from 2 million pounds ($112,700) a few months before the flotation to 4 million, as rival imported brands become unaffordable to many.

A 350-gramme jar of Swifax's high-end spread, Moltobella, costs 36 pounds, while its budget brand costs around 17 pounds. Its main imported competitor sells for about 70 pounds a jar.

Floating the pound helped Egypt to secure a $12 billion IMF loan in return for a reform programme that includes tax increases and electricity subsidy cuts, driving up inflation in a country where millions live a pay cheque from hunger.

Egypt also raised customs tariffs on many luxury goods to over 50 per cent, plugged customs loopholes and tightened quality controls in an effort to rein in a trade deficit the central bank blames for depressing the currency.

Importers criticised the increases, saying local producers do not have the capacity to fill the gap left by declining sales of foreign goods.

According to Emad Maher, manager of hypermarket chain Samy Salama, switching to local products has increased by 90 per cent, mainly because of the price difference.

"In some products, you can compare the local and imported and not find much difference [in quality]. But Egyptians are obsessed with everything foreign," he said.

At Covertina, another chocolate-maker, business is also booming. Chief Executive Mostafa Sayed Salam said production had risen 19 per cent in 2016 from the previous year. "After the flotation of the currency, it became hard for importers to sell the chocolate at the old prices," he said. "My market share has increased from 50 per cent to 65-70 per cent."

Narrowing the deficit

Multinationals are taking notice. Nestle, the packaged food giant, said in January it had signed a deal to acquire Caravan Marketing Company, an Egyptian instant coffee maker that had increased its domestic market share due to competitive pricing.

With Egypt long dependent on imports, the trend suggests the government's efforts to narrow a big trade deficit and boost domestic industries are starting to work.

Even before the float, imports had been falling due to shortages of foreign currency. Egypt had struggled to attract dollars and revive the economy after the 2011 overthrow of president Hosni Mubarak, with subsequent political turmoil driving away tourists and foreign investors.

Official trade figures for 2016 have yet to be released but a government official told Reuters earlier this month that the deficit had narrowed by 17.4 per cent compared to 2015. Imports fell to $62.93 billion from $70.28 billion, said the official, but higher exports also helped to shrink the gap. These rose to $20.26 billion in 2016 from $18.67 billion.

As the unofficial figures suggest, the weaker pound is also helping Egyptian exporters.

Hesham Zahra, chairman of Yasmine cosmetic company, said production had risen 25-35 per cent since the flotation boosted sales both at home and abroad. "Today our prices have become competitive in foreign markets, and we can compete with some countries in exports," he said, adding that Yasmine lotion retails for a quarter of the price of some imported brands.

Trade and Industry Minister Tarek Kabil told Reuters in October that Egypt had produced $4 billion worth of import substitutes since the start of 2016, and aimed to expand domestic industry by 8 per cent in three years.

Food industries were leading the way, he said, but local products were also compensating for a retreat in imported building materials, chemicals, leather and furniture.

"This is a golden opportunity for Egyptian producers," said Abu Bakr Emam, head of research at financial firm Prime Holding. "Local producers used to be unable to compete but now is the right time to go in to compete against imported goods due to the price advantage after the dollar rises."

Rising prices

Still, the pound's dive is a double-edged sword for local manufacturers who largely depend on imported raw materials.

At Swifax, Gammal said the cost of cocoa butter and hazelnut had more than doubled since the flotation. A tonne of hazelnut used to cost 90,000 pounds but now it costs 230,000.

This forced the company to dip into funds that had been earmarked for expansion. This will now take longer despite the more pressing need to raise capacity. "In the end we increased production without the expansion by tripling the shifts at our factories which adds a lot of strain on the machines," he said.

With Egypt aiming to raise economic growth under the IMF programme to 5.5 per cent by the 2018-19 fiscal year from 4.3 per cent in 2015-16, the government can ill-afford large numbers of firms to delay investment like Swifax.

But as prices rise, ever more families are looking to save money. "People right now don't care about the quality, it's all about the price," said once shopper in Cairo who called himself Abu Abdulla. "I walk around the supermarket and just look at the prices," he said as he pushed a trolley piled with seven family-size boxes of Egyptian-made biscuits.

Tapping into the trend, a Facebook group called "Made Proudly in Egypt" lists tried and tested local products, from foods to detergents and even pots and pans.

One of the more than half-a-million members of the group, writing under the name of Om Khaled, said the bargains sell fast. "I used to get [imported] nappies and baby food for my son and now I get local alternatives, but unfortunately the cheap Egyptian products are not always available. I have to look hard for them," she said.