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'Anti-austerity' Syriza party sweeps Greek general election

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ANI London
Last Updated : Jan 26 2015 | 10:55 AM IST

Greece's Syriza party, which opposes austerity measures imposed on the nation by the European Union (EU), has reportedly won the general election, setting the country up for a possible showdown with the EU over its massive bailout.

Syriza is projected to win 149 seats in the 300-seat parliament, just two short of an absolute majority, reported the BBC.

The left-leaning Syriza Party leader Alexis Tsipras, who wants to renegotiate the terms for repaying the 325 billion dollar bailout and has even floated the idea of "debt forgiveness," said "the Greeks wrote history."

The governing centre-right New Democracy stood a distant second.

The report said that outgoing Prime Minister Antonis Samaras conceded defeat and called Tsipras to congratulate him.

The elections have showed that majority of Greek voters have rejected the core policy, devised by Brussels and Berlin, for dealing with the eurozone crisis.

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In Germany, Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann said that he hoped that the new Greek government will not make promises "it cannot keep and the country cannot afford."

The election outcome is expected to be one the main points of discussion during Monday's meeting of 19 eurozone finance ministers.

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First Published: Jan 26 2015 | 10:46 AM IST

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