Alexis Tsipras launched a fierce attack on the government and Kyriakos Mitsotakis personally after the cynical admission of Adonis Georgiades.

«Mr Mitsotakis not only lied when he told us that no one had asked for tougher measures in time. But he quite consciously put once again the political cost above human life,» said the President of SYRIZA - Progressive Alliance.

«Now there is no doubt why for so long Mr Mitsotakis has refused to make public the minutes of the Committee of Infectious Diseases,» Alexis Tsipras stressed.

It is recalled that Adonis Georgiades said, among other things, that «we respected the faith and Thessaloniki mourned the most victims».

The statement of Alexis Tsipras:

The confession of the Minister of Development that Thessaloniki is mourning so many deaths from the pandemic because the government ignored the experts who had called for a lockdown before the feast of St Demetrios is chilling.

Mr Mitsotakis not only lied when he told us that no one had asked for tougher measures in time. But he quite deliberately put political costs above human life once again.

Unfortunately, we are not surprised.

And unfortunately, this attitude applies not only to what has happened so far but also to what happens from now on.

Experts warned of renewed complacency. They called the nine people for the holiday celebrations an «arbitrary decision».

Mr Mitsotakis ignored them.

Then, they learned from the media, before they even met and despite their objections, that the government was opening schools.

He ignored them again.

Mr Mitsotakis' criminal responsibility for the erratic management of the pandemic, the collapse of the NHS and the 5,000 human losses is a given.

As is his signature in the third wave of the pandemic outbreak, which scientists warn of after the holidays.

Now there is no doubt why for so long Mr Mitsotakis has been refusing to make the minutes of the Committee of Infectious Diseases experts public.

He makes decisions without even listening to scientists and tries to exploit them afterwards only to confirm his own political decisions.

https://www.facebook.com/tsiprasalexis/posts/10159125217903054

Reply of the government spokesman, Chr. Tarantilis, to a post by Al. Tsipras

«I regret that my first announcement as a government spokesman concerns the response to a post by Mr.Tsipras, the style of which borders on political confrontation,» Christos Tarantilis said in a statement.

«So I will invite him to tell us what is the decision he is referring to to take more stringent measures in Thessaloniki, which the government did not follow. When was it taken and by whom?;

I will also ask him, since he disagrees with the number of nine people in each house, to reveal to us, even afterwards, what his proposal was. I will also ask him to announce his position on the opening of schools.

Does he agree that they should be opened or not?;

As for the possibility of a “third wave” of the pandemic, I will invite the leader of the opposition to see what is happening in the rest of the world and remind him that the government has taken every measure possible to prevent it, although we have not seen him consent to any of them.

Political debate is an element of democracy. I suggest that it should not be exhausted in aphorisms and extreme characterizations that cause the aversion of citizens, but should be conducted with facts and arguments,» concludes in his reply the Deputy Minister to the Prime Minister and Government Spokesman, Christos Tarantilis.