GREECE faced a new test in its attempt to avoid bankruptcy yesterday as international auditors headed for Athens, while Germany suggested a new bailout may be renegotiated as argument rages over whether private creditors should take bigger losses.

The “troika” audit team from the European Union, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund started arriving yesterday and is expected to begin talks the day after on the Greek Government’s plan to deepen budget cuts and raise new taxes.

This will allow Athens to meet its commitments under a second aid program EU leaders agreed in principle in July that also touched off a new cycle of strikes and protests.

However, German Chancellor Angela Merkel suggested that parts of the new 109-billion-euro (US$148.6 billion) rescue for the debt-laden country could be reopened, depending on the outcome of the troika’s audit.

“We have to wait and see what the troika finds and what it will tell us [whether] we will have to renegotiate or not,” she told Greek state television NET, without elaborating.

Germany has repeatedly said negotiations about the details of the second rescue deal can begin only when the troika says Greece has qualified to receive a fresh, sixth tranche under the first bailout agreed back in 2010.

The second bailout aims to ease Greece’s debt burden by imposing a 21 percent loss on private Greek bondholders. However, many economists believe that a 50 percent loss is necessary to make the country’s debt viable.

The Financial Times newspaper reported that a split had opened in the euro zone over the deal. Quoting senior European officials, it said as many as seven of its 17 countries argued that the private bondholders should swallow bigger writedowns.

Hardliners in Germany and the Netherlands were leading the calls for bigger writedowns but meeting fierce resistance from France and the European Central Bank, which feared more selling of shares in European banks with big Greek bond holdings.

Germany’s Bundestag (lower house) will vote today on widening the scope of the European Financial Stability Facility bailout fund, as agreed by the EU leaders July 21.

Merkel faces a revolt within her conservative camp and may have to rely on support from the opposition Social Democrats and Greens to get the measure approved, damaging her authority.

In Greece, lawmakers opened the way to the troika visit yesterday by passing a property tax bill. That piles the pressure on Greeks suffering from several waves of belt-tightening and deepens an economic downturn heading into its fourth year. (SD-Agencies)