Tsipras prepares new party launch as political landscape shifts
Political attention in Greece is focused on the launch of a new party by former prime minister Alexis Tsipras this week. The party’s name, manifesto and core leadership team are expected to be presented on Tuesday evening at an event in Thiseio, central Athens.
PASOK’s proposal for a parliamentary investigation into the wiretapping case rejected
The proposal by PASOK to establish a parliamentary investigative committee to look into the wiretapping scandal was rejected in Friday’s plenary session of the Hellenic Parliament by the ruling majority, with 155 votes against the proposal and six in favor, meaning it failed to secure the required majority.
Mitsotakis announces extension of deadline in ‘My Home II’ program until end of August
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis began his regular weekly review of the government’s actions, posted each Sunday, by focusing on issues relating to housing and welfare. Among others he announced an extension for the deadline to complete the paperwork for loans under the “Spiti Mou II” (My Home II) program until the end of August for loans that have already been approved but may miss the original deadline of June 2 due to procedural delays, using national funds from the Hellenic Development Bank.
General government arrears to private sector stand at 3.1 billion euros in Q1
Public sector arrears increased by 526 million euros to 3.103 billion euros at the end of March 2026, based on figures from the General Government Monthly Bulletin published by the General Accounting Office.
ATHEX: Late surge has index end in black
The selective moves by traders at the Greek stock market dominated Friday’s bourse session and gave buyers a slight edge to offer the benchmark moderate gains at the end of a busy week. The record highs posted in Wall Street on Thursday and the prospect of a possible peace deal between the US and Iran gave a boost to local stocks in the last couple of hours of the session, including the closing auctions.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/1304625/athex-late-surge-has-index-end-in-black
SUNDAY PAPERS
KATHIMERINI: New political players and the battle for the North
TO VIMA: Political scenery: Alchemists and suitors
REAL NEWS: The new political “map” and the transfers of politicians
PROTO THEMA: Political scenery: an endless loony bin
MONDAY PAPERS:
TA NEA: Real estate assets: Two new taxes are coming…
EFIMERIDA TON SYNTAKTON: The government fears the new parties
KONTRA NEWS: Tsipras to launch large party ready to govern the country
DIMOKRATIA: Rackets worth hundreds of millions with NSRF programs
NAFTEMPORIKI: Alert by the Independent Authority for Public Revenue regarding cases threatened by the statute of limitations
DRIVING THE DAY
MAGYAR EYES A GRAND BARGAIN: Hungary’s new Prime Minister Péter Magyar heads to Brussels this week looking to strike a major political agreement with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to unlock €10.4 billion in frozen EU funds.
It’ll cost ya: The deal — which Magyar said could be signed Thursday — would offer a lifeline for Hungary’s economy, but would come at a price: Magyar’s government must commit to hitting “super milestones,” including far-reaching judicial reforms, before the money expires in August.
Mending fences: Magyar will also huddle with Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte while he’s in Brussels. Budapest wants to repair frayed relations with the transatlantic alliance, the prime minister told broadcaster RTL over the weekend.
There’s more: Hungary’s rule-of-law situation and its stance on Ukrainian membership in the EU are formally separate, but they’re linked politically. Budapest’s stance on Ukraine’s membership bid has repeatedly come up in conversations between Magyar, von der Leyen and European Council President António Costa, according to a diplomat informed on the exchanges who was granted anonymity to discuss them candidly.
Hungary and Ukraine: At the GLOBSEC conference in Prague on Saturday, Hungarian Foreign Minister Anita Orbán stopped short of saying that Budapest would back opening the first negotiating cluster for Kyiv in the coming weeks. Rights for Hungarian minorities in Ukraine are the “No. 1 thing which we need to settle” with Kyiv, “and then we can talk about everything else,” she told me.
Key meeting in June: An expert-level dialogue on minority rights is under way and Magyar has said he hopes to meet President Volodymyr Zelenskyy early next month in Berehove, a Ukranian city where Hungarians make up the largest ethnic group. That meeting is likely to happen if Budapest backs opening the clusters, per the same diplomat cited above.
That’s not all at stake for Magyar in Brussels … On stage in Prague, FM Orbán revealed that the European Commission had rejected Hungary’s application for a €16 billion loan under the EU’s SAFE defense investment program. “So we inevitably have to table it again,” she said.
The bottom line: Viktor Orbán left Magyar with a soaring budget deficit, which puts the new government under pressure to get as much financial support from the EU as it can, in whatever form. That provides rare leverage for Brussels to pull Hungary back into the mainstream — including on Ukraine, whose EU membership the former prime minister blocked for years.
BIG AND BREAKING
CYPRUS VOTES: The parliament in Nicosia will become more fragmented after the far right and antiestablishment newcomers made gains in a national election Sunday — though the center-right Democratic Rally remained the largest party. Nektaria Stamouli has the latest.
BALTIC BOUND: Ursula von der Leyen will travel to Lithuania for crisis talks with the country’s leaders Tuesday after a string of drone incursions, Playbook’s own Gabriel Gavin reports.
KYIV BOMBARDED: European leaders condemned a massive Russian air attack on the Ukrainian capital and surrounding areas that reportedly included an Oreshnik hypersonic ballistic missile and killed at least four people.
PITCHING AI TO THE POPE: Tech firms and Western diplomats are working hard to make their case inside the Vatican.
MIDDLE EAST LATEST: Donald Trump said last night he won’t rush into a peace deal with Iran, a day after signaling that an agreement to end the war was imminent, POLITICO’s Cheyanne M. Daniels reports.
20-SECOND PLAYBOOK PRIMER
There’s growing alarm surrounding the Ebola outbreak in Congo and Uganda, which has been declared a public health emergency of international concern by the World Health Organization. The outbreak involves the Bundibugyo virus, a rare type of Ebola that spreads primarily through contact with infected bodily fluids, and for which there is no vaccine. The epicenter is in an area affected by conflict. The risk Ebola poses outside Central and East Africa is minimal, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.
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3 MORE THINGS GETTING US TALKING
GERMANY’S SLOW-MOVING MILITARY: Berlin has unlocked the money to rearm the Bundeswehr, but now it has to prove it can turn cash into guns, missiles and tanks.
EU’S BIG TECH DRIFT: As the Digital Markets Act enters its third year, critics says it is too slow and unwieldy, my colleague Jacob Parry reports.
HOW TO STOP A RUSSIAN DRONE: Ukraine is betting on a homegrown electronic warfare system to disrupt and redirect incoming strikes.