ATHENS — Opposition Movement for Change (KINAL) leader Fofi Gennimata sternly attacked the government over the way it handled the outbreak of the pandemic, speaking on Thursday to ANT1 TV. "The government sent a message of relaxation and abandoned the national health system to its fate," she said, noting that the first mistake was to open up the country without any conditions.

The government did not work to support the National Health System, open ICUs and hire the staff needed for those units to operate, she said, adding that it had wasted six months by focusing on communications and on preparing for early elections in the autumn, while ignoring and trying to brush the problems under the carpet instead of trying to fix them.

On the government's tactics against Turkish aggressiveness and the start of the exploratory discussions, she said: "I don't trust secret diplomacy or a secret agenda".

She said that Greece should have a clear line and underlined that her party was always in favour of dialogue with Turkey but without blackmail and only on the issue of the continental shelf and EEZ.