Tsipras demands that the PM reveal why PASOK-KINAL leader was surveilled by EYP

Main opposition SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras during a parliamentary debate on surveillance conducted by the National Intelligence Agency slammed Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis as responsible for EYP’s wiretapping of the phone of centre-left PASOK-KINAL leader Nikos Androulakis, and rejected the PM’s assertion that the wiretapping was perfectly legal.

Under current law, the authority that requests surveillance and the prosecutor who issues the surveillance order for reasons of “national security” – Vasiliki Vlachou, who is attached to EYP. in this case – are not obliged to specify what those reasons are.

‘What national security reasons warranted spying on Androulakis?’

Tsipras persistently demanded, as has Androulakis over the last three weeks, that Mitsotakis reveal precisely what were the national security reasons that led a prosecutor to permit the surveillance of the European Parliament deputy, during the party leadership race last autumn, which he won.

In the likely event that under the current proportional representation law no party is able to form a single-party government, New Democracy, which consistently leads SYRIZA by a significant margin, was widely expected to form a coalition government with centre-left PASOK-KINAL (which places third in the polls], possibly along with some other smaller parties.

Surveillance of Androulakis a ‘criminally punishable act’; ‘the PM cannot hide behind Dimitriadis’

Tsipras said that is inconceivable for Mitsotakis to maintain that the wiretapping of the party leader was legal, and declared that his surveillance by EYP is a “criminally punishable act”.

Soon after his election, Mitsotakis placed EYP under the direct jurisdiction and supervision of the PM’s office, and it was the PM’s chief of staff and nephew (his sister’s son), Grigoris Dimitriadis, who was responsible for the supervision of EYP, a fact that has led opposition parties to maintain that the PM had direct knowledge from the start.

Dimitriadis, along with ex-EYP chief Panagiotis Kontoleon (who according to the government resigned because of the “mishandling” of an ostensibly legal wiretapping), was forced to resign on 5 August, with the justification that the move was necessary in order to defuse the “toxic climate” created by the affair.

Tsipras said that Mitsotakis cannot “hide behind the finger” of Dimitriadis.

“You are being accused of undermining the operation of the democratic form of government. You speak of immorality when you are accountable and accused of surveillance of your political opponents,” SYRIZA’s leader said.

“This is not a political mistake. It is a criminally punishable act when the surveillance concerns an elected representative of the Greek people. It is all the more inconceivable to invoke legality or a semblance of legality when the case concerns the elected leader of a political party,” he underlined.

“For three-and-a-half years, you have been building a regime by using every possible measure to cling to power,” he said.

‘The burglar shouts to scare the homeowner’

Tsipras used a Greek adage to argue that the government is making a fuss in order to disorient public opinion from its alleged crime.

“Our people say the burglar shouts to scare the homeowner,” he said. Here, however, no one will be scared, because you are the accused in a case involving an institutional aberration and the undermining of the democratic form of government.”

“How can you possibly maintain that a prime minister can conduct surveillance for reasons of national security? Who will judge those reasons, he and his close associates?” Tsipras asked the PM.

“Give us an answer. What was the reason? Was he an agent or a spy or a danger to national interests?”