Greek Socialist leader Evangelos Venizelos said Tuesday that Greece will be forced to hold new elections on June 17 after coalition talks among all Greece's political parties except the far right again failed to agree on forming a government.
The leader of the hard-left Syriza party, Alexis Tsipras (pictured) begins talks on Wednesday to form a coalition government, but faced an uphill battle as Greece’s main parties hesitated at his call to scrap the country’s EU-IMF bailout deal.
Greece has no government and could run out of money as early as next month. The state agreed to the terms of a second international bailout earlier this year, but the government that signed off on that deal is now out of power after an election that punished mainstream parties and put extremists in parliament for the first time. Laura Baines and her panel discuss how the Greek people can be led out of this mess and whether default and an exit from the euro are now inevitable.
Greece has no government and could run out of money as early as next month. The state agreed to the terms of a second international bailout earlier this year, but the government that signed off on that deal is now out of power after an election that punished mainstream parties and put extremists in parliament for the first time. Laura Baines and her panel discuss how the Greek people can be led out of this mess and whether default and an exit from the euro are now inevitable.
The leader of Greece’s leftist Syriza party, Alexis Tsipras, said on Tuesday that he plans to throw out the terms of the country’s EU-IMF bailout deal if he succeeds in fulfilling his mandate to form a new government.
Greece's leftist Syriza party was saddled with the responsibility of assembling a new cabinet on Tuesday, a day after efforts to form a coalition government by conservative leader Antonis Samaras broke down.
Greece's future is more uncertain than ever following an election that propelled extremists into Parliament. They include the far right Golden Dawn, a party whose leader gave a Nazi salute in Athens last year and the extreme left Syriza party. Both want to scrap the bailout agreement with the European Union and the IMF. It marks a huge change in Greek politics which for decades has been dominated by the main centre-left and centre-right parties.
Greek conservative leader Antonis Samaras (pictured) said that his efforts to form a coalition government had failed on Monday amid concerns over the country’s political and economic future.
The European Commission has said that it "hopes and expects that the future government of Greece will respect" its austerity engagements, one day after elections widely seen as a protest at the EU-IMF bailout terms broke the ruling coalition.
Voters delivered a blow to Greece's traditional ruling parties, the conservative New Democracy and the Pasok socialists, on Sunday as voters moved to anti-austerity parties on the far right and left. Nobody won enough votes to form a government.
