ATHENS — Despite the fact that government officials asserted the state mechanism was fully prepared to deal with the onslaught of the snow-dumping weather front, "the only plan they actually had was the 'Stay Home' plan," Communist Party (KKE) leader Dimitris Koutsoumbas said in a statement on Tuesday.

The dreadful conditions in Attica where a 20-cm snowfall led to the extended shutdown of national motorways and central roads, immobilised public transport and disrupted power for entire areas "reflect the huge defiencies in the civil protection sector, in the planning and in the infrastructure serving people's needs," he added.

The government and authorities responsible "should find the means to clean up the streets from the snow without delay" and to ensure that mass transport means operate normally." Most of all, Koutsoumbas stressed, there should be safe access to hospitals and the mass vaccination programme should continue without delay.