Independent Greeks MP to be questioned over bribery claims

Independent Greeks MP Stavroula Xoulidou is to appear before a Supreme Court prosecutor on Thursday to answer questions regarding claims that she was offered a bribe to back the government's presidential candidate.

Xoulidou said in a televised interview earlier this week that she received a call from a New Democracy official who told her that if she backed the coalition government's nominee she would "solve her financial problems" and that "the amounts in such matters usually reach 2 or 3 million."

The leader of the nationalist party, Panos Kammenos, backed Xoulidou's claims during the same television show, saying that MPs had been approached by cadres of the two parties in government, New Democracy and PASOK, as the coalition scrambles to put together a 180-seat majority in the 300-seat House in presidential elections in February and stave off snap polls.

Supreme Court Appeals Prosecutor Panayiotis Panayiotopoulos in October had investigated similar claims made by opposition SYRIZA party, which cited a media report saying that businessmen were creating a fund to be used to bribe MPs to back the government's nominee. He ruled that he had found no evidence to back such claims.