ENGLISH SECTION
29/06/2025 | 13:45
PM Mitsotakis: ‘We made significant efforts to cleanse OPEKEPE but we failed
The developments surrounding OPEKEPE, the Greek authority for the payment of EU aid to farmers under the Common Agricultural Policy, dominated the weekly review posted by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Sunday.
“Let me start by making it clear that you won’t hear me attempt any ‘trade offs’ with the past, along the lines that ‘others did the same’ in order to justify inertia in the present and for the future. I know that you put your trust in us to change those things that are badly done and not perpetuate them. However hard the battle with the deep state may be. As it turns out, the chronic weaknesses of OPEKEPE enabled clientelist behaviour expressed as favours. Unfortunately, including by our own party. Significant efforts for a clean up were made but, let us be honest: we failed. The dialogues now coming to light cause indignation and outrage,” the prime minister said.
The time had come to “cleanse the rot”, he added, noting that the government’s decision to abolish OPEKEPE and transfer its operations to AADE was in aid of this. Mitsotakis also made it clear that anyone shown to have received European funds to which they were not entitled will be asked to return them.
“With respect to the political behaviours, I have only one thing to say: if we want to truly be a European democracy, we cannot tolerate practices that are reminiscent or appear to be reminiscent of transactions for a few votes. This concerns all of politics, which must at last say no to old-style partisanship,” he underlined.
The premier’s post also referred to the NATO summit, which decided on a drastic increase in the Alliance’s defence spending over the next 10 years. “Greece continues to spend more than 3% of its GDP on defence, remaining in the inner core of NATO countries that exceeded the 2% target, even in the difficult years of the economic crisis,” he pointed out.
Commenting on the conclusions of the European Council, he stressed that Greece achieved significant diplomatic victories. “We, the ’27’, clearly repeated in our conclusions that the Turkish-Libyan memorandum is illegal and also null and void. We stressed, also, the need for Libya’s cooperation with the EU since the increase in migration flows from Libya and their instrumentalisation are a security challenge that Europe cannot ignore. We cannot allow traffickers to decide who enters the European Union,” he said.
source ANA-MPA
