Greece's coalition government wins vote of confidence

PanARMENIAN.Net - Greece's new three-party coalition government won a vote of confidence in parliament early Monday, July 9, ending a period of uncertainty that led to two elections in less than two months, though the country has a long way to go to emerge from a deep recession and pay down its huge debt, AP reports.

There were no surprises in the vote. All 179 deputies of the three parties supporting the government - conservative New Democracy, the socialist PASOK and the moderate leftist Democratic Left - voted in favor. Voting against were the 121 deputies of the Radical Left Coalition (Syriza), the nationalist right Independent Greeks, the extreme right Golden Dawn and the Communist Party.

In his concluding speech just before the vote, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras said that, despite their diverse political backgrounds, the three coalition partners have a unity of purpose - to keep the country in the Eurozone and out of its deepest and longest recession, now in its fifth year.

"Us three, we have admitted our past mistakes and we are now embarked in a common cause," Samaras said, addressing the opposition. "You keep clinging to your own dogmas and the same old populist logic. ... Unfortunately, (our opponents) don't seem to have matured. Fortunately, we don't take them seriously," he said.