Greek coalition in serious doubt

DEMETRIS NELLAS

ELENA BECATOROS

Asso­ci­ated Press

ATHENS, Greece — Crit­i­cal talks to form a gov­ern­ing coali­tion in crisis-struck Greece foundered once more, lead­ing the coun­try one step closer to new elec­tions — and bring­ing its con­tin­ued pres­ence in the euro into seri­ous doubt.

Last-ditch efforts by Pres­i­dent Karo­los Papou­lias to bro­ker a deal between wran­gling party lead­ers ended with no deal in sight late Sun­day, a week after national elec­tions pro­duced a dead­lock, with no party win­ning enough seats to form a government.

State tele­vi­sion said talks would con­tinue Mon­day evening between the heads of the par­ties that came in the top three spots in the elec­tions, the con­ser­v­a­tive New Democ­racy, rad­i­cal left-wing Syriza and social­ist PASOK, plus the head of the small Demo­c­ra­tic Left party, which is in a king-maker position.

But Syriza said it would not attend the talks, state tele­vi­sion said, throw­ing the entire meet­ing into question.

Syriza head Alexis Tsipras cam­paigned on a plat­form for Greece to pull out of its com­mit­ments in the inter­na­tional bailout agree­ment, which has given the coun­try bil­lions in res­cue loans. He has insisted he can’t back a gov­ern­ment that won’t over­turn the harsh aus­ter­ity mea­sures taken in return for the bailout.

“Syriza refuses to be a left-wing alibi for a gov­ern­ment that will con­tinue the poli­cies the peo­ple rejected on May 6,” NET state tele­vi­sion quoted Tsipras as saying.

Spokes­men for the three other par­ties said they would attend Monday’s meeting.

Vot­ers furi­ous at the han­dling of Greece’s finan­cial cri­sis and two years of harsh aus­ter­ity mea­sures taken in return for the bailout loans pun­ished the for­merly dom­i­nant PASOK and New Democ­racy, which saw their sup­port crum­ble to his­toric lows. Syriza made big gains, more than tripling its pop­u­lar­ity to come in sec­ond place after cam­paign­ing on an anti-bailout platform.

New Democ­racy head Anto­nis Sama­ras, PASOK leader Evan­ge­los Venize­los and Demo­c­ra­tic Left head Fotis Kou­velis, agree a coali­tion must be formed that will work to guar­an­tee Greece’s con­tin­ued pres­ence in the euro, but have insisted it must have the par­tic­i­pa­tion or at least the sup­port of Syriza.

In return for €240 bil­lion ($310 bil­lion) in res­cue loans from the Euro­pean Union and Inter­na­tional Mon­e­tary Fund, Greece has imposed severe spend­ing cuts, includ­ing slash­ing pen­sions and salaries in the pub­lic sec­tor, and repeated rounds of tax hikes. The aus­ter­ity has left Greece mired in a fifth year of deep reces­sion, with unem­ploy­ment spi­ral­ing above 21 percent.

“After today’s meet­ing it is obvi­ous they are demand­ing that Syriza become an acces­sory to a crime,” Tsipras said ear­lier, after the dis­cus­sions with the pres­i­dent. “In the name of democ­racy, of our patri­otic duty, we can­not accept this shared guilt. We call on all Greeks to con­demn once and for all the forces of the past and to real­ize that only one hope remains: unity against black­mail in order to pre­vent the con­tin­u­ing barbarity.

“Fel­low Greeks, we can assure you of one thing: we will not betray you.”

If no solu­tion can be found, Greece will have to hold new elec­tions next month, pro­long­ing the polit­i­cal uncer­tainty and bring­ing the country’s con­tin­ued mem­ber­ship in the euro into doubt.

Posted by AP News on May 13 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.