Politics of Europe

Ilias Kasidiaris, a former Golden Dawn MP who was given a 13-year jail; sentence, presents arguments for suspending the sentence at an appeal court in Athens, 16 October 2020. Photo: EPA-EFE/PANTELIS SAITAS

The Greek parliament on Tuesday passed a new amendment to recent legislation to ensure the far-right Greeks-National party cannot participate in elections due in May.

On Holy Wednesday - start of the 49th National Assembly. Today, the deputies will gather at a solemn meeting, which will be presided over by the oldest member of parliament.

As in the previous parliament, it is Vezhdi Rashidov in this one as well.

After taking the oath, the deputies must also elect the Speaker and Deputy Speakers of the National Assembly.

"If 'We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria' (WCC-DB) forms a coalition with GERB, in the next elections the first political force will be 'Vazrazhdane'". This is what Asen Vassilev, the co-chairman of "We Continue the Change", told Nova TV.

"All the parties in the coalition, after the decisions of their national bodies, have decided that the coalition will not support a government with a mandate or the participation of the political party GERB". This was stated by Asen Vassilev from "We Continue the Change" (WCC) at a briefing of the coalition.

From the formation, they also started their analysis of the results

Torn election posters of Kostadin Kostadinov, leader of Bulgaria's pro-Russian ultranationalist party Revival, the day after the parliamentary election, in Sofia. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

Belgian police and German investigators carried out a raid on Tuesday at the headquarters of the centre-right European People's Party (EPP) as part of an investigation in Germany.

The party, which has the most members in the European Parliament, said in a statement that representatives of authorities from Belgian and Germany had visited its headquarters in Brussels on Tuesday.

"The pro-European forces in Bulgaria must put the state above the party and work together to form a stable majority."

This was written by Manfred Weber - chairman of the group of the European People's Party (EPP), the parent party of GERB. Weber was a guest at the closing of the pre-election campaign of Boyko Borisov's formation.

The results of the GERB-SDS and WCC-DB coalitions after the elections for the 49th National Assembly are in favor of GERB-SDS by more than one and a half percent difference. In the battle for the third place - "Vazrazhdane" leads by less than 1 percent difference over DPS. The fifth is BSP, "There Is Such a People" are also part of the parliament.

The first results of exit polls taken by the four sociological agencies registered with the Central Election Commission show the following distribution of the 240 seats in the Bulgarian Parliament after Sunday's elections:

Alpha Research

Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) 71 MPs

GERB-UDF 69 MPs

Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) 38 MPs

It seems like a historical paradox, but after the end of the communist system, the far right made a strong showing in the Balkans.