Cyprus's president Nicos Anastasiades says he is battling against EU leaders' demands that all bank customers pay a one-off levy in return for a bailout.
Mr Anastasiades said he shared people's unhappiness with the terms, whereby all bank customers would pay a levy - either 6.75% or almost 10% - on their bank deposits.
The EU and IMF have demanded the levy in return for a €10 billion bank bailout. The one-off levy is to raise €5.8 billion.
The president said Cyprus had had to choose between stabilising its finances or the eventual collapse of its financial system and exit from the eurozone.
Mr Anastasiades said he would continue to fight with the eurogroup to amend their decisions to limit the impact on small depositors, the BBC reports.
"The solution we concluded is not what we wanted but is the least painful under the circumstances," he said.
Under the bailout's terms, people in Cyprus with less than 100,000 euros in their accounts would have to pay a one-time tax of 6.75%. Those with sums over that threshold would pay 9.9% in tax.
Depositors will be compensated with the equivalent amount in shares in their banks, and Mr Anastasiades promised that those who kept deposits in Cypriot banks for the next two years would be given bonds linked to revenues from natural gas.
It is believed that eurozone leaders, particularly in Germany, insisted on the levy because of the large amount of Russian capital kept in Cypriot banks, amid fears of money-laundering.
The speaker of the European Parliament, Germany's Martin Schulz, has called for the levy to be revised to protect small-scale bank customers.
