"We put our own heads on the chopping block, we will lead Greece out of the recession"

Aiming to embolden his parliamentary group, but also announce new initiatives, president of PASOK and Prime Minister Giorgos Papandreou called all PASOK parliament members to a meeting, which took place in the Senatorial room, in Parliament, on Saturday.

Mr. Papandreou announced the initiative to gather one million signatures of European citizens, in order to discuss the Eurobond issue in Europe, after the stern denial on Angela Merkel's part to agree to any form of discourse on the matter. The Prime Minister proceeded to form a team that will apply its efforts on the issue. The team members are V. Papandreou, P. Efthimiou, K. Vrettos, N. Alevras, P. Economou, H. Mosialo, A. Podimata and C. Polizogopoulos.

Mr. Papandreou underlined that Greece's achievement in the Summit meeting on Friday, which is the creation of a stable support mechanism, was unimaginable a year ago. He also proceeded to answer to all those that criticize his support of the Troika coming to Greece, that they should consider who brought Greece to this point. He stated that: "We put our own heads on the chopping block, we will lead Greece out of the recession". He added "... it would be easy to shoot the messenger, but the fact remains that we already know the contents of the message".

The prime minister remarked on the comments heard of his frequent trips to other countries. He said that he travels to defend Greece and its rights, which is closely correlated with international and European events. Finally, he reminded his critics that he comes from a family of immigrants and that for him, "Greece is not fate, it is a choice".

Last but not least, Mr. Papandreou described the government's upcoming agenda, which will consist of: State- Public governance, growth, social participation, social state and foreign policy.