Greek PM in bid to boost alliances both at home and abroad
Having spent his first three weeks in office establishing his administration and drafting three key bills, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis now plans to shift his focus to two goals: a flurry of meetings with foreign leaders aimed at securing more fiscal space for Greece and exploratory alliances at home.
The premier is to embark on his itinerary of trips abroad with a visit to Cyprus on Monday and Tuesday.
There he is to meet with Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades and other officials for talks that are expected to focus on Turkey’s continued insistence on illegally prospecting for hydrocarbons in Cyprus’ exclusive economic zone despite the threat of sanctions from the European Union.
The first week of August will be spent legislating and then, following a short break, Mitsotakis is expected to travel to Paris for talks with French President Emmanuel Macron, most likely after August 20.
He is then scheduled to travel to Berlin, on August 29 where talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel are expected to focus on Greece’s economic reform efforts and Mitsotakis’ bid to reduce high primary surplus targets by 2021.
During a brief meeting in Athens in February, Merkel reportedly displayed great interest in Mitsotakis’ plan to attract more foreign investment to Greece.
After a scheduled trip to the Netherlands on September 2 and 3, Mitsotakis is to shift his focus to the United Nations General Assembly in New York on September 24, where he is to make his first appearance as premier in a global forum.
Back home, Mitsotakis’ medium-term goal is to foster alliances with other political parties ahead of plans for a second phase of constitutional review in the fall and his government’s plan to change the electoral law introduced by leftist SYRIZA of simple proportional representation.
Further down the line, Mitsotakis will pursue the creation of a parliamentary investigative committee to probe the previous leftist government’s first six months in power, which brought Greece close to a euro exit and saddled the country with a third international bailout.
