Athen, July 7 (IANS) Voters across Greece voted on Sunday in the first parliamentary elections since the 2008 global financial crisis that triggered financial bailouts leading the Greek economy to shrink by 28 per cent and increasing unemployment.

Polling stations opened at 7 a.m. and will close at 7 p.m. About 9.9 million citizens of 17 years and above are eligible to vote, reports Xinhua news agency.

Exit polls are expected to be released shortly afterwards, as the first official estimates will arrive at around 9 p.m., and the final results on Monday, according to the Interior Ministry.

A total of 20 parties are running the campaign, which demands a 3 per cent threshold to enter the 300-member parliament, according to the Greek electoral law.

Most recent opinion surveys indicated that Greece’s main opposition conservative New Democracy (ND) party would win with a margin of 8-15 percentage points over the radical left SYRIZA party led by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and have an outright majority in the parliament.

Tsipras, who came to power in 2015, has promised more investment and recently boosted pensions. His own investment policies would also have to be renegotiated with creditors as the country remains under eurozone supervision.

Polls also showed that the centre-left Movement of Change would rank third, likely followed by the Communist Party of Greece.

The economy is once again the main issue for consideration when voters cast their ballots, according to polls. </s> Greece: A look at the main candidates in Sunday's election

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece holds a general election Sunday, called three months early by left-wing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras after he suffered a stinging defeat in European Parliament elections in May to conservative rivals who appear to be strengthening their position according to recent opinion polls.

The ballot comes as the country struggles to emerge from a decade of deep financial crisis that slashed size of Greece's economy by a quarter and sent unemployment and poverty rates soaring. The parliamentary election is the first since Greece ended its third consecutive international bailout program.

Here is a look at the main parties and candidates running:

The Athens-born civil engineer is a veteran of Greek politics at age 44, leading the once-marginal Coalition of the Radical Left, Syriza, to a landmark election victory in 2015.

Politically active since his teenage years, Tsipras rose to power as Greece's economy was plunged into financial crisis and voters turned their backs on traditionally dominant parties. Tsipras was first elected on a promise to scrap the draconian terms imposed for bailouts by European Union institutions and the International Monetary Fund,

But he was forced to accept a third rescue deal to keep Greece in the euro. He has since dropped a confrontational stance toward Germany and other large creditor nations and has also built closer military ties with the United States.

Praised by Western allies, his government also hammered out a historic compromise with Balkan neighbor North Macedonia, in a name-change deal that remains broadly unpopular among Greeks.

Tsipras has promised to rebuild public services after years of hardship and funding cuts and insists his party can overturn a huge gap in opinion polls.

Despite facing skepticism within his own party, the 51-year-old Mitsotakis has built a huge lead in opinion polls spanning back three years and is the strong favorite to win Sunday.

A tireless campaigner, Mitsotakis is the Harvard-educated son of the late prime minister Constantine Mitsotakis whose combative style as conservative leader in the late 1980s and early 1990s still remains controversial.

The younger Mitsotakis, leader of Greece's conservative establishment party since January 2016, has struggled to shed an image of family privilege. He focused his campaign on blue collar voters and pledged to make the country more-business friendly, cut taxes, and modernize Greece's antiquated bureaucracy.

Mitsotakis served in a previous conservative government as minister of administrative reform. Unlike many other conservative leaders in the EU, he remains a staunch supporter of deeper European integration. He disputes claims by the Tsipras government that he is tied to the rightist wing of his party and favors privatizing welfare services.

Currently polling in third place, the 54-year-old Gennimata is leader of the Movement for Change, a rebranded Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement, or Pasok, the party that dominated the government for three decades but was devastated by the financial crisis a decade ago and has lost the bulk of its support to Prime Minister Tsipras' Syriza party.

An effort two years ago by Gennimata to expand the party, joining forces with other centrist groups, was tarnished by multiple policy and administrative disputes within the revamped party. Gennimata has overtaken the extreme right Golden Dawn Party for third place in opinion polls before Sunday's election.

The former director of a Communist newspaper, Dimitris Koutsoumbas, 63, is the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Greece, KKE, a party that maintained unwavering support for the Soviet Union's leadership over decades while other Communist parties in Europe distanced themselves from Moscow.

Koutsoumbas has defended party political traditions and orthodoxy, focusing attacks on its one-time ally Syriza, accusing it of selling out workers' rights. The KKE's leadership failed to win over any significant boost in public support for the party during the financial crisis and has seen its share of the vote dip over the last 20 years.

Three other parties are vying for seats in parliament — set by a threshold of 3% of the vote nationwide.

Golden Dawn is an extreme right party founded by neo-Nazi supporters 34 years ago, and leaders are currently on charges related to incitement to violence. The party has suffered a sharp drop in support before Sunday's vote.

Former Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis founded a pan-European anti-austerity party in 2016 and narrowly missed the threshold in Greece in European Parliament elections in May.

And far-right TV pundit Kyriakos Velopoulos and his party Greek Solution has seen a surge in support in recent months. </s> • Europeans from 21 countries have started voting on the fourth and final day of the EU parliamentary elections.
• The results should be clear late on Sunday, with exit polls in Germany expected at 1600 UTC.
• The Netherlands, the UK, Ireland, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Malta and Slovakia have already voted.

07:45 The election will hopefully strengthen anti-immigration political forces across Europe, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said after casting his vote in Budapest. "I hope that there will be a shift in the European public arena in favour of those political parties who would like to stop migration."

07:15 Support for the Green Party surged in Ireland — where the vote was held on Friday — putting the Greens on course to win as many as three European seats, according to an exit poll for broadcasters RTE/TG4. European Greens co-lead candidate Bas Eickhout spoke of a "green wave" rolling on to Irish shores from the Netherlands, where an exit poll put GroenLinks' (GreenLeft's) share of the vote up to 10.5%.

06:40 The European Parliament forms the democratic basis of the European Union. It plays a key role in electing the president of the European Commission and ensures EU institutions are working democratically. The Parliament shares power over the bloc's budget and legislation with the Council of the European Union, which represents the governments of member states. Elections to the Parliament take place every five years and voter turnout has been steadily declining. In 2014 it was the lowest ever — just 42.5%.

06:25 Around 400 million people are eligible to vote for 751 MEPs who will serve for the next five years and help shape Europe’s future. There's a lot at stake. The issues of Brexit, immigration and the rise of right-wing parties across the bloc could bring some surprises and make these polls the most important since the first direct elections 40 years ago.

06:00 Polling stations in 21 EU countries, including major EU states of Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Poland, have opened.

Read more: EU election: Europeans head to the polls across the continent

Voting is also taking place in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia and Sweden.

The Netherlands and the UK headed to the EU polls on Thursday — the first day of election — followed by Ireland and the Czech Republic on Friday and Latvia, Malta and Slovakia on Saturday.

A total of 420 million EU citizens are eligible to cast their ballot in these elections.

According to exit polls, the Netherlands' center-left party of EU Vice President Frans Timmermans won the most votes and added two seats to the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) bloc in the EU Parliament.

In Britain, hundreds of non-British EU citizens were turned away from polling stations on Thursday after being told they were not registered to vote in the UK for the election. The British government is now facing a potential legal challenge over the denial of votes to EU citizens.

As Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Poland send almost half of all MEPs to the European Parliament – 348 out of a total 751 – the Sunday vote is dubbed the most crucial of all rounds. Opinion polls suggest that far-right groups and Euroskeptics could gain more strength in the European Parliament, with populist parties such as Marine Le Pen's National Rally in France and Matteo Salvini's Northern League in Italy are expected to perform well in the polls.

Read more: Opinion: The EU's future and the European Parliament vote </s> Polling stations opened at 7am local time for the European Parliament elections. Voting will continue until 6pm with a one-hour break from 12pm until 1pm. The final results will be given by the Chief Returning Officer at midnight.

A total of 72 candidates from Cyprus are competing for six seats in the European Parliament. Of the 72 candidates, 69 are backed by political parties or coalitions, and three are independent. Candidates also include nine Turkish Cypriots who are citizens of the Republic of Cyprus.

A total of 641,181 people are eligible to vote.

Fifty polling stations have been set up for the 80,862 Turkish Cypriots eligible to vote, who live in then north of the island.

For Cypriots living abroad, a total of 21 polling stations will operate for 6,135 voters. There will be 12 in Greece, seven in England, one in Brussels, and one in Scotland.

Meanwhile, a total of 10,559 EU citizens are registered to vote in Cyprus.

Special arrangements have been made for disabled persons. </s> Last month, Skopje and Athens settled a decades-old dispute by agreeing that Greece's northern neighbour will go by the name "Republic of Northern Macedonia."

The breakthrough has prompted Athens to lift its opposition to Macedonia joining NATO, of which it is a member.

"We welcome the historic agreement between Athens and Skopje on the solution of the name issue," NATO leaders said in their joint summit statement. "In line with our policy, we have decided to invite the government in Skopje to begin accession talks to join our alliance."

But for Macedonia to join, it must still approve the deal with Greece in a referendum and constitutionally change its name. Only after that will the Greek parliament ratify the deal andMacedonia's membership in NATO.

Nationalists in both countries vehemently oppose the deal.

Since 1991, when Macedonia emerged as a sovereign state from disintegrating Yugoslavia, Athens has accused it of attempting to steal the Hellenic legacy of the Greek province of the same name and even of aspirations toward Greek-Macedonian territory. </s> NATO and EU leaders have applauded Greece’s parliament for approving the historic agreement with neighbouring Macedonia, following days of heated debate and clashes in the streets.

Greece’s parliament on Friday backed ratification of the highly controversial agreement that is designed to end the decades-long dispute over Macedonia’s name.



In the vote that ended at 14.30 pm local time, 153 MPs from the ruling parties and from some opposition parties in the 300-seat parliament endorsed the agreement, which Macedonia has already adopted.

A total of 146 MPs voted against it.

Greek ratification marks the final act of the “Prespa” agreement’s implementation, after Macedonia on January 11 altered its constitution, allowing the country’s name to be changed from Republic of Macedonia to Republic of North Macedonia.



In exchange for changing its name, to which Greece objected, Greece has agreed to lift its blockade on Macedonia’s NATO and EU accession bids.

Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev expressed his delight. “Congratulations my friend [Alexis] Tsipras. Together with our peoples we reached a historical victory. Long live the Prespa Agreement! For eternal peace and progress of the Balkans and in Europe!” Zaev wrote on Twitter.

Macedonia’s Foreign Minister, Nikola Dimitrov, said hope had triumphed over fear.

“Courage and hope have defeated fear. The future is there. As Nikos [Kotzias, former Greek foreign minister] often says, history should be a teacher, not a prison. I am so proud of what we did. Long live our friendship and the friendship between our nations! Long live visionary patriotism!” Dimitrov wrote on Twitter.

EU enlargement commissioner Johannes Hahn called the agreement “a historic breakthrough for the two countries, the region and Europe as a whole. I applaud the leaders on both sides for their courage and vision!”

“They had imagination, they took the risk, they were ready to sacrifice their own interests for the greater good. Zoran [Zaev], Alexis [Tsipras]– well done! Mission impossible accomplished”, European Council President Donald Tusk wrote on Twitter.

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg tweeted that ratification of the deal in Greece was “an important contribution to the stability and prosperity of the whole region. I look forward to the future Republic of North Macedonia joining NATO.”

In a joint statement, the European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee Chair David McAllister and EP rapporteur for Macedonia Ivo Vajgl also praised the achievement.

“We commend the immense statesmanship, determination and political courage of the leaders and confirmed by the parliaments of both countries. Unblocking a seemingly unresolvable dispute has taken intensive diplomatic efforts and the compromise would not have been possible without the support and responsibility shown by political and civic actors across the two countries,” they wrote.

Ratification of the deal in Athens is an important victory for the Greek Prime Minister. “We are one step before an historic event,” Tsipras told parliament on Thursday, one day before the vote.

Tsipras said that the previous failures to solve the long-standing dispute had deprived Greece of precious diplomatic capital, and he accused the conservative opposition New Democracy party, which opposed the agreement, of being hypocritical.

New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis told parliament before the vote on Thursday that the deal was a “national defeat” and a “minefield” that once ratified would be impossible to scrap and difficult to amend.



He added that if he is elected Prime Minister, he would retain the right to block Macedonia’s EU accession at any time.



Before the vote, Independent Greeks leader Panos Kammenos, who quit the ruling coalition earlier this month over his disagreement with the name deal, accused Tsipras of seeking to break up his party. A handful of former members of Kammenos’s party, as expected, provided crucial support for approving the deal.

During the three-day parliamentary debate leading up to the vote, the tense atmosphere spilled onto the streets.

On Thursday night, thousands of opponents to the name deal gathered in Athens to protest and smaller clashes with the police were reported in front of the parliament.

In one incident, a group of protesters spray-painted “Macedonia is a Greek Land” outside the home of US Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt in Athens, the police said.



In another incident in Katerini in Northern Greece, on Thursday night, three police officers were injured and 11 protesters were detained in a scuffle at a police cordon that was preventing a mob from reaching the home of the ruling coalition MP Elisavet Skoufa.



After ratifying the deal, parliament in Athens is expected soon to approve Macedonia’s NATO membership bid under its new name.

If this happens, Greece will be the first NATO member state to make such a move, in a process that is expected to pass other national parliaments during this year, resulting in Macedonia becoming a NATO member.

Western countries and the US lobbied strongly for the compromise deal, hoping to see an end to one of the region’s most arcane, disruptive and long-standing disputes.

The quarrel dates back to Macedonia’s independence from the former Yugoslavia in 1991. Greece promptly objected to the former Yugoslav republic’s name, insisting that the word Macedonia formed part of Hellenic heritage, and insisting that its use implied a territorial pretension to the Greek province of the same name.

Years of mediation failed to achieve any result until Greece’s Tsipras and Macedonia’s new centre-left leader Zoran Zaev agreed a compromise solution signed last June on the banks of Lake Prespa, which divides the two countries. </s> Greece's government has survived a no-confidence vote over a deal to end a bitter decades-long name dispute with its northern neighbour which called itself Macedonia at the break-up of the former Yugoslavia.

Parliamentarians voted 153-127 to keep Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras's administration in place.

The coalition government, led by left-wing Syriza, needed at least 151 of its 154 members of parliament to vote against the proposal.

The coalition's junior partner - the Independent Greeks (ANEL), a right-wing party - says it opposes the deal but only one of its MPs backed the censure motion in parliament. Panos Kammenos, leader of ANEL and defence minister, subsequently kicked the lawmaker out of the party.

The motion was brought by the conservative New Democracy party which accused the government of making too many concessions over the agreement which will eventually see the small country - which declared independence from Yugoslavia in 1991 - renamed the Republic of North Macedonia.

"Today, you are all mortgaging the future of the country," Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the New Democracy leader, told parliament ahead of the vote.

Addressing Tsipras, Mitsotakis added: "You will be the prime minister to say 'Yes' to everything your predecessors said 'No.'"

In response, Tsipras accused Mitsotakis of political opportunism and "of being hostage of the far-right wing of your party".

Talking about the deal, Tsipras described it as good, adding "that any Greek prime minister after 1995 and the interim agreement would like to have on the table."

"It not only includes a compound name with a geographic qualifier, used erga omnes, but also sets as a condition a change of the constitutional name by which the country has been recognised by 140 countries. It includes a constitutional change to eradicate every irredentist term in their constitution," Tsipras pointed out.

Outside the parliament building in the capital, Athens, police earlier fired teargas as thousands protested against the deal.

The parliament debate, which stated on Thursday, was marred by a rant by an MP of the far-right Golden Dawn party on Friday who urged the army to arrest Tsipras, Kammenos and President Prokopis Pavlopoulos because of the agreement.

The deal to rename Greece's northern neighbour North Macedonia was announced on Tuesday by the prime ministers of the two countries after six months of talks to end the 26-year standoff.

Greece has long objected to the former Yugoslav state calling itself Republic of Macedonia, which it said implied territorial aspirations on its northern region of the same name.

Since the fall of communism, Greeks have called the country to their north Skopje, after its capital city, and its people and their language as Skopjan.

The New Democracy party said the deal brokered by Tsipras and his counterpart, Zoran Zaev, is "opposed by the overwhelming majority of Greek people".

In Skopje, there has also been a heavy backlash against the agreement, with the president declaring his refusal to sign off on the deal. The agreement must clear the hurdles of parliamentary ratification, a referendum in September and a constitutional amendment.

In Athens, the deal only faces ratification in parliament once Skopje has completed its part of the process.

ANEL says it will not support it when it comes up for ratification in parliament. That would leave Tsipras dependent on opposition parties to pass the measure.

Under the agreement, which is tentatively scheduled to be signed on Sunday, the country's Macedonian language and nationality is sanctioned, albeit with the proviso that they are of Slav, not ancient Greek, origin.

North Macedonia would agree that its "official language and other attributes … are not related to the ancient Hellenic civilisation, history, culture and heritage of the northern region of [Greece] " and would make constitutional changes to remove claims on Greek soil. </s> The vast majority of those who voted in Sunday referendum in Macedonia supported the plan to rename the country and thereby end a decadeslong spat with Greece and unlock a path to EU and NATO membership, but low turnout compromised the results of the referendum.

With ballots from 80 percent of polling stations counted, 91.2 percent of votes were in favor of the name changing to North Macedonia, compared to 5.6 percent opposing the move, according to the electoral commission's official count.

However, Sunday's vote was marred by a low turnout, with only a third of the electorate voting.

The vote failed to secure the 50 percent turnout required to make the vote valid, the head of the election commission said Sunday.

"On this referendum it is clear that the decision has not been made," election commission head Oliver Derkoski told reporters.

Greece reacted to the result with the Foreign Ministry saying it "remains committed" to its June agreement with Skopje under which Athens would drop its objections to Macedonia joining the EU and NATO in return for a change of name,

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras expressed his support for his Macedonian counterpart in a telephone call in which he hailed the "determination and courage" of Zoran Zaev to "complete the implementation of this agreement." a government source told AFP.

Zaev had earlier voiced confidence that the country would support a yes vote.

"I think the huge majority of the citizens who voted have chosen the European path for Macedonia," the social-democrat leader said, an hour after the polls closed.

But two-thirds of voters stayed away from the polling stations for the non-binding referendum on whether to change the name of the country to "North Macedonia".

Zaev urged the right-wing opposition, who might well question the vote's credibility due to the low turnout, to "respect the democratic will of the citizens" and ratify the deal in parliament or face "early parliamentary elections."

For the two-thirds parliamentary majority required to ratify the result, Zaev and his coalition partners from the ethnic Albanian minority need at least a dozen MPs from the opposition to back the move.

Opponents of the change, who had called for a boycott of the name-change referendum, announced plans for a celebration outside parliament, where they had set up a stage during the afternoon. However, barely 300 people gathered there an hour and a half after the polls closed.

The vote is an emotional moment for a country that has struggled for recognition of its name since 1991, when the former Yugoslav republic declared independence.

At the time, Athens kicked up a major fuss, accusing Skopje of stealing the name of its own northern province, which is also called Macedonia.

The dispute dives deep into history with both countries vying to lay claim to Alexander the Great's ancient empire of Macedon, which spanned their territories.

Zaev has billed the referendum as a painful but "historic" opportunity to break the 27-year-old stalemate.

The June deal, however, has been openly opposed by Macedonia's President Gjorge Ivanov, who is allied with the nationalist opposition and had supported calls for a boycott of the referendum.

Few Macedonians are enthused about the new name, saying they have been unfairly bullied by Greece.

"I am not happy and I do not know anyone who likes this deal," said 55-year old Danica Taneska, who admitted voting "no" to the change.

But a desire to anchor their future to the West -- and the economic prosperity that it could bring -- has been a driving force behind the "yes" vote in one of Europe's poorest nations.

The referendum is not binding, but a "yes" majority gives parliament a political mandate to change the constitution.

Sunday's vote was closely watched across the border in Greece, where nationalists staged a protest against the deal earlier this month.

"We hope for a positive outcome for the proceedings to progress with the constitutional review," Greek government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said on the radio earlier.

"Any other result would create a disturbance."

Europe and the U.S. have campaigned hard for the deal, with many leaders passing through Skopje this month to urge Macedonians to seize the "historic" opportunity.

NATO has already issued an invite -- on hold until the deal passes -- while EU accession talks are scheduled to begin next year.

The West is keen to have another foothold in the Western Balkans, a region where Russia, which is opposed to NATO expansion, has historically had influence.

At home, those in favor of the deal say a desire for an EU future is helping bind ethnic Macedonians with the Albanian minority, who are broadly pro-West.

While Macedonia avoided the full-scale inter-ethnic wars that rippled across the region during the collapse of Yugoslavia, it was roiled by an Albanian insurgency in 2001 that left more than 100 dead.

A peace deal was reached later that year granting Albanians more political rights, but tensions have remained. </s> SKOPJE (Reuters) - Macedonia held a referendum on Sunday on whether to change its name to ‘Republic of North Macedonia’, a move that would resolve a decades-old name dispute with Greece which had blocked its membership bids for the European Union and NATO.

Greece, which has a province called Macedonia, maintains that its northern neighbour’s name represents a claim on its territory and has vetoed its entrance into NATO and the EU.

Athens and Skopje struck a deal in June based on the proposed new name, but nationalist opponents argue the change would undermine the ethnic identity of the country’s Slavic majority population.

President Gjorge Ivanov has said he will not be voting in the referendum and a boycott campaign has cast doubts on whether turnout will meet the minimum 50 percent required for the referendum to be valid.

The question on the referendum ballot read: “Are you for NATO and EU membership with acceptance of the agreement with Greece”.

Supporters of the name change, including Prime Minister Zoran Zaev, argue that it is a price worth paying for admission into the EU and NATO.

“I came today to vote for the future of the country, for young people in Macedonia so they can be live freely under the umbrella of the European Union because it means safer lives for all of us,” said Olivera Georgijevska, 79, in Skopje.

Although not legally binding, enough members of parliament have said they will abide by the vote’s outcome to make it decisive. The name change would requires a two-thirds majority in parliament.

The state election commission said there had been no reports of irregularities in the fist two hours of the vote. Turnout stood at 2.45 percent.

“I came out to vote because of my children, our place is in Europe,” said Gjose Tanevski, 62 voter in Skopje.

In front of the parliament in Skopje, Vladimir Kavardarkov, 54, was preparing a small stage and pulling up chairs in front of tents set up by those who will boycott the referendum.

“We are for NATO and EU, but we want to join with our heads up, not through the service door” Kavadarkov said. “We are a poor country, but we do have dignity.”

“If they (NATO and EU) don’t want to take us as Macedonia, we can turn to others like China and Russia and become part of Euro-Asia integration.”

Prime Minister Zaev says NATO membership will bring much needed investment to Macedonia, which has an unemployment rate of more than 20 percent.

“I believe the huge majority will be in favour because more than 80 percent of our citizens are in favour of EU and NATO,” Zaev said after casting his ballot.

He said that a “yes” result would be “confirmation of our future.”

A poll published on Monday by Macedonia’s Institute for Policy Research (IPIS) said between 30 and 43 percent of voters would take part in the referendum - below the required turnout.

Another poll, conducted by Macedonia’s Telma TV, found 57 percent of respondents planning to vote on Sunday. Of those, 70 percent said they would vote yes.
Citizens of Greece go to the polls to vote for the next members of the Hellenic Parliament.