London, Thanasis Gavos

As “one of those issues that is a long-standing bogeyman”, described the dispute with Greece over the Parthenon Sculptures, the UK’s under-secretary for home affairs, Tom Tugendhat.

Asked by Sky News if he agreed with Prime Minister Rishi Sounak’s accusation against his Greek counterpart that he wanted to overshadow the Downing Street meeting by “putting on a show” about the Sculptures, Mr Tugendhat replied that “Mr. Mitsotakis will certainly make comments like these,” as he has his own domestic political agenda. “That doesn’t always help,” he added.

He said that in such cases the groups of prime ministers spend weeks determining what will be discussed. “If it gets to a point where there is no agreement on that, the meeting is not going to happen,” he added.

However, he avoided answering the question if he considers the cancellation of the meeting by Mr. Sunak to be the right move. “My opinion is that the prime minister had to make a decision, he has many decisions to make prioritizing is a very difficult thing to do at Number 10,” replied Mr. Tugendhat.

In the meantime, The Guardian unleashes slurs against Rishi Sunak with its main article, which speaks of an “unnecessary diplomatic outburst”.

Including the newspaper accuses the British prime minister of poor strategic judgmentoverreaction, childish nerves, lack of grace.

“A more skillful politician than Mr Sunak could have found a way to articulate displeasure without breaking up the meeting”, concludes the British newspaper.

He adds that the inability to deal with the situation with a diplomatic rebuke betrays “political weakness and temperamental defect”but as he then adds “inherent Eurosceptic bias” on the part of the British leader.