Simitis slams SYRIZA ahead of Euro elections

Ahead of May’s European Parliament elections, former socialist prime minister Costas Simitis has lambasted the ruling SYRIZA party as opportunistic and for siding with the right and far-right of the political spectrum to gain power.

“It cooperated with the far-right and [the nationalist Independent Greeks party],” he said on Saturday while addressing a conference of the center-left Movement for Change (KINAL), adding that SYRIZA failed to underscore the responsibility of the conservative government of Costas Karamanlis (2004-09) for Greece’s excessive deficits that contributed to its financial crisis.

Simitis served as president of the socialist PASOK party and prime minister from 1996 to 2004.