The failure to reach an agreement for the second week in a row highlighted the depth of differences among officials on how to find the money to keep the Greek economy afloat to contain contagion in the euro zone even as the country’s debt prospects worsen.
The German finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, said after nearly 12 hours of talks that some of “the questions are so complicated, we didn’t find a conclusive solution.” Finance ministers will meet again Monday to resume the discussions, he added.
Mr. Schäuble also noted that European leaders could take up the discussions during a two-day summit meeting in Brussels that is to begin Thursday. As part of that effort, the spokesman for the Greek government said Prime Minister Antonis Samaras would hold talks Thursday with Jean-Claude Juncker, chairman of the euro zone finance ministers’ group, known as the Eurogroup, Reuters reported.
“Greece has done what it had to and what it had committed to doing,” Mr. Samaras said in a statement. “Our partners, along with the I.M.F., also must do what they have undertaken.”
While there is little immediate threat that creditors will deny further aid to the government in Athens, finding a formula to turn the spigot back on has proved intensely difficult, particularly for Germany, where Chancellor Angela Merkel is seeking to avoid making new financing commitments to the most vulnerable euro area countries, like Greece, ahead of her re-election campaign next year.
That has left the leadership of the euro zone jawboning at a seemingly endless series of late-night meetings.
Greece is seeking to unlock a €31.5 billion, or $40.3 billion, installment of loans from an international bailout program. If ministers do reach a deal, Greece is likely to get a larger amount, about €44 billion, because two additional installments are due by the end of the year under the program.
The current program, worth a total of €130 billion, has been frozen since June, when creditors determined that Greece was failing to meet the conditions of the bailout.
During closed-door discussions that began Tuesday evening, ministers and international officials also were at loggerheads over whether to give Greece two more years, to 2016, to reach a primary budget surplus, a concession requiring nearly €33 billion on top of existing bailouts.
Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, insisted that financing Greece until 2016 would help it to the path of making its debt manageable by the end of the decade.