The Greek parties’ leaders failed to agree for a second time within a few days, although their meeting today was held under the auspices of President Karolos Papoulias, which itself has stressed its importance. "I will go ahead alone," stated according to government sources the Prime Minister to the President after the meeting, which lasted about three hours and a half. The same sources claim that George Papandreou does not intend to trigger early elections.
The meeting started with the President Karolos Papoulias’ call to the political leaders to realize the seriousness of the situation. He said it is time for important decisions and emphasized that the political forces bear the historical responsibility to agree.
According to government sources, after the meeting of the leaders of political parties, the Prime Minister George Papandreou stated his decision to continue alone, without the consent of the main opposition party. Thus, the desired agreement between the political parties was not reached, but the government is not in a hurry to take it off the agenda. "The agreement issue remains open. The relations between the political parties are not distant. There is still an opportunity for agreement, although we are not talking about a complete change in their position," was the comment of the staff of the Greek Prime Minister.
Some sources say that the Prime Minister told the leaders of political parties that he did not invite them to blackmail them with early elections but to agree to improve the political environment and send a clear message to the creditors and the financial markets. In an attempt to support this position, George Papandreou said that the parliamentary elections would take place when they should, i.e. in 2013.
He presented the discussion topics: the deficit reduction, the privatization, etc. A little earlier, the Minister of Finance Georgios Papakonstantinou presented the current state of the Greek economy. According to government sources, the Prime Minister showed that he is ready to hear suggestions and discuss different options for emerging from the crisis under pressure from creditors to reach an agreement.
"Yes" to the agreement, but only after re-negotiating the terms of the Memorandum of economic assistance and reducing the tax rates, said the leader of New Democracy Andonis Samaras after the meeting. His statements made it clear that the Prime Minister is ready to incorporate into his own plan the proposals of the main opposition party, with the exception of the reduction in taxes.
Andonis Samaras said yet again that New Democracy could not join a policy that destroys the society and the economy and deviates from the objectives that Europe sets for us. We could not agree with extortions that reject the essence of the democracy, said the leader of New Democracy.
The chairwoman of the Communist Party Aleka Papariga expressed her complete disagreement with the topics for discussion set by the Prime Minister.
The leader of the far-right party LAOS George Karatzaferis was the first to show with his statements the outcome of the meeting. His proposal for forming a coalition government involving all parties was not approved, and his statement that for some people the chair is more important than Greece was interpreted as a direct attack against Andonis Samaras.
The leader of the left coalition SYRIZA Alexis Tsipras said that the mere holding of the meeting is recognition of the failure of the government policy.