Surprisingly the Greek parliament suspended their activities until the upcoming European parliament elections, which will take place on June 7^th. On Friday late at night, the administration of the National Assembly received a presidential enactment, signed by Karolos Papoulyas. After the elections, the parliament members will continue their activities according to the summer schedule and the plenary sessions will renew during fall.

The opposition reacted negatively on this decision, because the minority Parties saw an opportunity to cover-up big corruption scandals, which involved parliament members form the opposition. The socialists PASOK leader Georgios Papandreou characterized the decision of the managing majority as an “institutional coup d’état, which will receive its feedback from the public.” “This is an unseen and provocative decision, which wants to cover-up all criminal acts of ministers in the period 2004-2007. This is one cynical decision,” believes the socialist leader.

The opinion of the communists from the Greek Communist party is the same: “Independently of what the Constitution says, the sudden shut-down of the parliament aims either to cover-up criminal acts or to hide other dark intentions, or both. The public needs to give an answer to this rotten political system,” says the declaration of the communists. Similar were the comments of the Radical Leftists Coalition members.

“After Pavlidis, Siemens and Man, the possibility to suspend all parliament activities, because of the euro elections seemed as the only salvation for the parliament. Unfortunately, it did not take into consideration our offer to continue working and it preferred to hide its criminal activities, done by ministers in the last five years,” says the declaration of the far right party LAOS.

During the last day of the Greek parliament spring session the former PASOK minister Christos Verelis resigned. His name was implicated in the newest corruption scandal with the German automobile giant Man.