IMF team due in Turkey

A team from the International Monetary Fund was due in Ankara on Wednesday for talks on completing arrangements for a new IMF loan to Turkey worth several billion dollars, an official source said.

The team will spend about 10 days here meeting with Turkish economic officials and business representatives.

Experts have said the new line of credit could be in a range of 20 to 25 billion dollars (14.7-18.4 billion euros) over a period of 18 to 24 months. The IMF and the Turkish treasury said last month they had made "considerable progress" toward an agreement on a new loan programme. Turkey's previous agreement with the IMF, a three-year 10-billion-dollar credit, expired in May 2008.

An earlier three-year accord worth 16 billion dollars, enabled Turkey to overcome an acute economic crisis in 2001.

In the last several months employers and economic officials have urged the government to strike a new deal with the IMF to help the country cope with the global economic downturn, which has led to major job cuts in the automobile and textile sectors.

ANKARA, AFP