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The council of finance ministers of the euro zone member states approved the list of reforms that the Greek government had sent to its lenders, namely the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

A representative of the Greek Ministry of Finance announced the news that Commissioner for Monetary Affairs Pierre Moscovici confirmed a little later.

At the same time, the Eurogroup urged Athens to further develop and broaden the list with reform measures within the context of the present agreement and in close cooperation with the institutions (known until recently as the supervisory Troika) in order to allow for a speedy and successful completion of the assessment of the Greek rescue programme.

The communication of the Eurogroup still states that the list proposed by Athens is sufficiently comprehensive to be accepted as a starting point for a successful conclusion of the rescue programme.

In turn, Director of the International Monetary Fund Christine Lagarde said that the list was sufficient for the financial aid to Greece to continue, adding however that the document lacked clear commitments. "While the list is comprehensive, it is generally not very specific. There are no clear assurances that the Government intends to undertake the key reforms," reads her letter to Eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem.

She describes as "encouraging" the increased readiness of the new Greek government to fight tax evasion and corruption. However, in other sectors, "including perhaps the most important ones," such as the pension reform, VAT policy and labour law, Christine Lagarde does not find clear commitments on the part of the authorities in Athens to implement the reforms.

President of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi requested guarantees that for any measure that is different from the previous memorandum the Greek government will submit another measure with the same financial result.

Similar was the reaction of Slovakia’s Minister of Finance Peter Kazimir, "Greeks have lots of heavy lifting to do until the end of April. We all want to see numbers now."

While the Eurogroup teleconference was underway, the Ministerial Council in Athens held a meeting that was full of reactions and controversies regarding the list of reforms. According to the Greek media, many ministers had "strafed" with remarks Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and Minister of Finance Yanis Varoufakis because the content of the list had nothing to do with the pre-elections promises of SYRIZA. However, the government sources defined the meeting as "constructive".

The reactions on the turn in the policy of the cabinet, however, started yesterday, the most significant among them being that of MP and economics professor Kostas Lapavitsas. In his personal blog, he published a text that asks the government how it will implement the main points of its pre-election programme having signed an agreement with the lenders. "How will it finance the national plan of reorganisation, since Greece no longer controls the three billion euro from the fund for financial stability? How it will act in favour of writing off the public debt since Greece is committed to meet all financial obligations to its partners on time? How will it stop the policy of austerity, since Greece is committed to achieve "suitable" primary budget surpluses in order for its debt to be "sustainable"? How can any progressive change take place in the country since the "institutions" will exercise strict control and prohibit unilateral action? What exactly will change over the next four months of "extension" so that we are in a more favourable position in the new round of negotiations with our partners? What is it that will prevent the political, economic and social situation in the country from worsening?

The moments are absolutely critical to society, the nation and, of course, the Left. The democratic legitimacy of the government is based on the programme of SYRIZA. The absolute minimum required is to hold an open debate in the party bodies and the parliamentary group."

Meanwhile, opposition leaders attacked SYRIZA too. New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras analysed the measures which the government of SYRIZA and Independent Greeks will apply and which his office was going to implement in a milder and different way. "The country has lost two months in pre-election uncertainty and one month in "fictitious negotiations" to return to the position in which it was last November. Eventually we met with SYRIZA at the exit of the memorandum. We were going out while they were going in at a great speed," he said.

The statement of PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos was similar too, "We were ready to exit the memorandum and enter the precautionary credit line under not so restrictive conditions. Instead, we will remain in the old memorandum for months and we are preparing to sign a third one in July." Venizelos said the government of SYRIZA had veered round and yielded so much that "the Troika or the institutions, as they call it now, is forcing the new Greek government to write the memorandum with their own hands."

At 8:00 pm tonight, the parliamentary group of SYRIZA will hold an extraordinary meeting to discuss the list of reforms approved by the lenders of Greece.