Germany Owes $303 Billion War Debt, Greek Parliament Told

German economy minister calls claim ‘dumb’

ATHENS—Greece’s government publicly quantified its long-standing claim for World War II-related compensation from Germany, continuing to press claims that Berlin says have long since been settled.

Deputy Finance Minister Dimitris Mardas told a committee of Greece’s parliament Monday that Germany owes Athens €278.7 billion ($303.1 billion), according to calculations by the country’s General Accounting Office.

The Greek government has set up a parliamentary panel, which started work last week, and which will seek to press for the payment of war reparations as well as the repayment of a forced loan that Nazi Germany made the Bank of Greece lend the wartime German occupiers.

Mr. Mardas said the forced loan is now worth €10.3 billion including accumulated interest. The rest of the Greek claim relates to wartime atrocities against the Greek population and damage to property and infrastructure.

The estimation of the value of Greek war-related claims on Germany was commissioned from the General Accounting Office by the country’s previous government and was delivered late last year. Mr. Mardas’s comments in parliament are the first time the estimate has been publicly revealed.

Greek politicians have said in the past that Germany owes the country more than €160 billion in reparations, but claims have never been quantified officially.

Since coming to power in late January, Greece’s left-led government has redoubled the country’s claims for wartime reparations, which Germany insists were settled decades ago under various agreements.

The issue has come to the fore since the start of Greece’s debt crisis, but the left-wing Syriza party’s rise to power in January this year gave new momentum to Greece’s claims. Syriza has tapped into a deep-seated feeling of injustice in Greek society toward Germany, which is seen in Greece as the source of the harsh austerity program imposed on the country since its international bailout in 2010.

But the renewed wartime claims have angered Berlin, which sees them as an unwelcome distraction from the more urgent tasks of fixing Greece’s economy and public finances.

The move comes amid rising tension between the two over the Greek government’s resistance to implementing the tough economic measures Germany and other eurozone countries insist are necessary to unlock further financial aid.

Germany has already officially rejected mounting calls from Athens, further souring the mood between the eurozone’s main paymaster and Greece’s cash-strapped government.

Germany reiterated its rejection of Greece’s reparations claims on Tuesday. German economy minister Sigmar Gabriel called the claim “dumb,” saying the emotionally loaded issue was getting mixed up with Greece’s bailout program, and that raising such claims against Germany wasn’t the right way to make progress on Greece’s precarious finances.

Greek Justice Minister Nikos Paraskevopoulos last month, while addressing parliament, even suggested that Athens could seize German assets in Greece, a threat Germany dismissed as groundless.

Write to Nektaria Stamouli at nektaria.stamouli@wsj.