ATHENS – Greece’s major opposition SYRIZA leader Stefanos Kasselakis said the ruling New Democracy is trying to have it both ways in a spat that broke out over North Macedonia’s new President calling her country Macedonia.

Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova used that designation in violation of a 2019 deal in which Greece’s then ruling Radical Left SYRIZA gave away the name of the northern Greek province Macedonia to the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM.)

That created the new name for the country as North Macedonia, with a geographical qualifier, but a nationalist party has come to power there and seemed to try to undermine the agreement and reclaim the name Macedonia.

While out of power, New Democracy objected to the deal and voted against it and Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis quickly condemned Siljanovska-Davoka’s remarks as provocative and in violation of the agreement.

But Kasselakis, a Greek-American who came to power in 2023, said there was duplicity and pointed to Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis saying the election of North Macedonia’s nationalist VMRO-DPNE party would bring a chance to revise the deal.

When the deal was being made, some New Democracy officials said they would try to amend it if they came to power. They did but didn’t make a move for revisions after Mitsotakis went along with it despite reservations.

Kasselakis said in a post that, “They had hoped that the VMRO would emerge victorious. They fostered expectations among nationalists on the other side that together they would annul the Prespes Agreement. Now that the VMRO has won, they are begging.”

He added that, “Through such phraseology, through this political deception, they gambled with a national issue for the sake of a few thousand far-right votes,” he said. “Let the democratic world contemplate the wounds that hatred, propaganda, and amorality can inflict, when given 41 percent.”

With European Parliament elections looming in June, and SYRIZA hoping to make inroads into New Democracy’s seemingly unassailable lead, “New Democracy voted against the 2019 agreement,” he said in a social media post. “In fact, it warned at that time about the problems that its shortcomings would create.”

“However, as a government, we respected the Greek signature on an international treaty that binds the country. Unfortunately, the recent development confirms our consistently cautious position,” he added.