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Greek election: Parties make final push for votes

Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras addressed his supporters in Athens on Thursday

Parties in Greece are making their last pitch for votes ahead of a repeat election seen as crucial to the debt-laden country’s future in the eurozone. New Democracy, the pro-bailout conservative party which narrowly led at the ballot last month, is due to hold its last big campaign rally.

Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras addressed his supporters in Athens on Thursday

Syriza, the anti-bailout bloc which surged to second place in May, held its final rally in Athens on Thursday.

Unofficial opinion polls suggest a fall in support for anti-bailout parties.

Under Greek election law, official opinion polls are banned in the two weeks before the election.

Tough austerity measures were attached to the two international bailouts awarded to Greece, an initial package worth 110bn euros (£89bn; $138bn) in 2010, then a follow-up last year worth 130bn euros.

While five of the seven main political groups reject the last bailout, only one – the Communists – wants the country to abandon the euro.

Germany, which has the eurozone’s most powerful economy, insists Greece, like other member-states which have received international bailouts, must abide by the austerity conditions.

German Bundesbank (central bank) chief Jens Weidmann repeated the warning on Friday, adding that the eurozone could not allow any country to “blackmail” it with the threat of financial contagion.

 

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