SYRIZA will vote “yes” to defense spending today during the upcoming vote on the 2024 budget.

“We have announced the decision of the president of SYRIZA, that we will vote “yes” on defense spending, in tonight’s vote,” said SYRIZA Department Head Evangelos Apostolakis, in his statements to the parliamentary editors.

“This decision sends the message that the country must be shielded, the armed forces must be strong, that there must be support of the Armed Forces executives and support of the domestic defense industrys”, said the Head of the Defense Department of SYRIZA and added: “In any case, SYRIZA will continue to monitor the course of the country’s defense armour, whether the rules of transparency in the contracts are respected, in order to avoid the recurrence of problems that existed in the past , as in the contract for the training center in Kalamata, the contract for the six Rafales but also the contract for the amphibious vehicles that did not even fit on the ships. Likewise, we will insist on the need to support the domestic defense industry.”

In particular, speaking to the parliamentary editors, Mr. Apostolakis clarified that “the president is sensitive to national issues. We disagreed with 4 programs, among them Kalamata and the additional Rafales. Dendias has caught it well, but SYRIZA will not vote whatever comes. The triptych is defense shielding, transparency and emphasis on the support of the ED personnel and the domestic defense industry.”

In this direction, the Head of the Defense Department of SYRIZA also referred to yesterday’s speech by the Minister of National Defense Nikos Dendias, commenting that “he has well announced the review from the beginning, from scratch, of the armament programs, to see what we really need, in what order should we take them, in relation to the fiscal situation of the country”. After all, said Mr. Apostolakis, technology has evolved and therefore this evolution must be included in the analyzes and decisions that will be taken by the Ministry of National Defense.