In an interview, Panos Kammenos mentioned the years of the SYRIZA – ANEL co-government.

Speaking to ANT1, he referred to the referendum, the Prespa Agreement, while also making predictions for SYRIZA and Alexis Tsipras.

According to Mr. Kammenos, Yanis Varoufakis had accepted the proposal of Schäuble, who after the referendum proposed Greece’s exit from the Eurozone, while Alexis Tsipras was “blackmailed” for the Prespa Agreement.

Referring to the 17-hour negotiation that resulted in the agreement on the third memorandum, Panos Kammenos argued that it was done with Obama’s intervention in Hollande.

“In 2015 Greece decided to change geopolitically and make an agreement with the USA” he said and added that he conveyed to the USA that the expansion of the Souda base will proceed, the port of Alexandroupolis will be upgraded and a series of other actions will proceed in order for Greece to become America’s main ally in the Mediterranean instead of Turkey.

He claimed that Tsipras – Varoufakis and Kammenos met before the Eurogroup on the 24th floor of a hotel, where he heard Varoufakis’ views on exiting the euro and it was he who took the initiative to communicate with the US and specifically with his counterpart, Nuland, so that for the US to mediate to end the negotiation, as it did.

“Indeed, Barack Obama spoke by phone with Alexis Tsipras. Then Obama together with the French president Francois Hollande mediated and thus the agreement on the third memorandum was closed. The deal was closed because Greece turned to the US. This is a truth that needs to be told. I spent three years speaking out because I didn’t want to get involved in the Greek political scene. After Alexis Tsipras decided to retire, the Greek people should know the truth,” said the former president of the Independent Greeks.

“The Prespa Agreement is a trap”

Speaking about the Prespa Agreement, he said it was a trap that Alexis Tsipras walked into, with the gift of the Nobel Peace Prize.

“Our cooperation with Alexis Tsipras was honest until Prespes. We made an agreement in 2014 according to which the government would not open the issue of Skopje. Tsipras was not pressured by the Left to make this deal. He was pressured by Germany and the Democrats in the US. We had agreed with the Americans that there would be a tripartite military cooperation, but not in name. But all that was reversed. The Prespa Agreement was a trap set for Tsipras by the Germans with the gift of the Nobel Peace Prize!

He said that, “one night at the winter residence of the president of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic”, he found himself in a discussion in which the Germans were the ones who insisted on an agreement with Skopje and not the Leftists in Greece. “I told Alexis Tsipras then that if something like this were to happen, I would leave the government.”

Tsipras and SYRIZA

Commenting on Tsipras’s statement about a “necessary evil” for the cooperation with ANEL, he estimated that he lost votes, while he said that “our cooperation was excellent with the only blemish being the Prespa Agreement”, he said.

As for the attitude of Alexis Tsipras, he said that he suffered “enormous political damage” by passing policies such as the agreement with the USA and then did not support them when they were continued by the New Democracy.

“You don’t change the party with demolition materials, it took unsuccessful executives from PASOK”, he said about Tsipras’ choices.

While he estimated that SYRIZA has “finished” and that Kyriakos Mitsotakis won the biggest victory since 1974. According to Panos Kammenos, it was the policy of Alexis Tsipras that led him to shrink and finally to resign.

Asked if Alexis Tsipras will return, he estimated that he will not, but even if he does, he will not return to SYRIZA.

Finally, when asked if he would return to politics, he said, “for me, politics is over, I served 28 years as an MP, 7 years as a minister, there are younger people who can do the job. If I can help with my input, I will, but I’m retired. We set a goal to get the country out of the memorandums and we got it out.”