Two more electricity price hikes in Serbia next year: "It has been agreed with the IMF"

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Finance Minister Sinisa Mali said today that it has been agreed with the IMF that there will be two more electricity price increases in Serbia next year, but that they will be far lower than the increases in Europe.

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"Those price increases will fit into the inflation, which is projected to be at 11.3 percent next year, and the price of electricity will be far below what we see in Europe," Mali said on Friday.

Responding to journalists, he denied the assessment of the Fiscal Council that we are an over-indebted country.

"Serbia is not over-indebted, because the share of public debt in GDP is 55.1 percent, which is below the Maastricht level of 60 percent and below the EU average of 95 percent. I agree with the data of the Fiscal Council, but I do not agree with the conclusions," said the finance minister.

Mali stressed that the loans taken by the government are used for investments, not for consumption, like in 2008, and that the old loans are getting regularly repaid.

"By the end of this year, the share of public debt in GDP will be 55.5 percent, so how are we over-indebted? This is our victory, considering all the investments in the energy sector that we had this year," Mali stressed, according to Tanjug.

(Telegraf Biznis)