Euro zone, IMF to share aid effort for Greece-draft

BRUSSELS, March 25 (Reuters) - The euro zone and the International Monetary Fund will share the burden of financial aid for Greece, if Athens requests it, but the euro zone will shoulder the majority of the burden, a draft agreement drawn up by euro zone countries showed on Thursday.

The aid for Greece from the 15 other countries using the euro would come via bilateral loans, said the draft statement obtained by Reuters.

"This mechanism, complementing International Monetary Fund financing, has to be considered ultima ratio, meaning in particular that market financing is insufficient," it said.

"Any disbursement of the bilateral loans would be decided by the euro area member states by unanimity subject to strong conditionality and based on an assessment by the European Commission and the European Central Bank," it said.

"We expect euro member states to participate on the basis of the respective ECB capital key," it said.

(Reporting by Jan Strupczewski, editing by Timothy Heritage)