Greece crisis: Judge appointed caretaker PM as country sets new elections

SENIOR judge Panagiotis Pikramenos was named Greece’s caretaker prime minister today, and new elections will be held on June 17, according to reports on state TV.

• President Karolos Papoulias convened the country’s political leaders again today

• Caretaker government will lead Greece into new elections

• Nine days of power-sharing talks collapsed

The last election on May 6 left no party with enough votes for a majority in parliament, after voters furious with the handling of the country’s severe financial crisis deserted the two formerly dominant parties, the conservatives and socialists.

They turned instead to a myriad of smaller parties, with big gains for those who pushed for Greece to pull out of its international bailout agreements.

Mr Papoulias met six of the seven parties that garnered enough votes for parliamentary seats: conservative New Democracy’s Antonis Samaras; Alexis Tsipras of the Radical Left Coalition, or Syriza; socialist PASOK’s Evangelos Venizelos; and the heads of three smaller parties.

The only one not present was the head of the extremist right-wing Golden Dawn party, who was protesting about not being invited to yesterday’s negotiations over a proposal to agree on a government of technocrats.

The inability to form a government and the prospect of another inconclusive general election have increased concern over Greece’s ability to cope with its crippling financial crisis and threaten the country’s continued participation in the euro.

The instability comes at a critical time, with Greece expected to take yet more austerity measures next month to meet targets laid out in its bailout deal with other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund.