Greece's newly elected anti-austerity government has said it will not co-operate with its international "troika" of creditors - the European Union, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
Greece's finance minister Yanis Varoufakis said that despite warnings his country would shortly run out of money, his government preferred to do without fresh funds and instead renegotiate its entire €240bn (£180bn) bailout package.
Athens has been promised another €7.2bn (£5.4bn) in funds from the troika if it completes reforms required by its lenders by 28 February, when the bailout programme runs out.
"This government was elected on the basis of analytically questioning the very logic of the programme now being applied," Mr Varoufakis said, referring to the reforms and budget cuts demanded by the troika.
"We don't want the €7bn ... We want to sit down and rethink the whole programme."
But the stance has already drawn criticism from EU officials and the bloc's biggest economy, with Germany's Angela Merkel reportedly saying there should be no debt reduction for Greece.
At a strained news conference with Eurogroup chief Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Mr Varoufakis said Athens was willing to negotiate with its lenders but not with the troika, which he described as a "committee built on rotten foundations".
Mr Dijsselbloem insisted Greece should stick to its reform commitments.
He said Greece and the Eurogroup had a "mutual interest in the further recovery of the Greek economy inside the eurozone" and warned against Athens acting unilaterally in its efforts to renegotiate its bailout.
"Taking unilateral steps and ignoring previous arrangements is not the way forward," Mr Dijsselbloem said.
"The problems of the Greek economy have not disappeared or changed overnight with the elections."
Further concern comes from the potential of the anti-austerity political movement spreading to other EU nations.
A large turnout is expected today in the Spanish capital Madrid, in support of the new far left party Podemos.
The troika was formed in 2010 to rescue debt-riddled Greece with the bailout on the condition Athens imposed huge spending cuts and fiscal reforms.
Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was elected last Sunday on a platform of ending austerity and erasing most of the country's national debt.
He will meet Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi on Tuesday and French President Francois Hollande on Wednesday, a source in his office said, to push for renegotiations of the bailout.
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