SYRIZA Vows to Avoid Grexit as Talks Begin with Independent Greeks

Coalition talks have started between leftist SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras and the Independent Greeks right-wing party's Panos Kammenos.

Their meeting was scheduled for 10:30 EET, though Kammenos arrived a little earlier at the SYRIZA headquarters, the English-language website of Kathimerini reports.

According to Greek media outlets, it is "a hundred percent certain" that a coalition will be formed.

But RIA Novosti quotes Athens sources as saying that Kammenos rejected taking part in a government with Tsipras as early as Sunday evening, when the two talked over the phone.

Meanwhile MP Yanis Varoufakis of SYRIZA has sought to dismiss speculation that Greece would leave the Eurozone once Tsipras ditches the international agreements with the EU and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

"We who are in the Eurozone must not toy with loose of fast talk about Grexit [as the prospect of Greece abandoning the euro is commonly referred to] or fragmentation. If that happens, disruptive forces would be unleashed... Grexit is not on the cards," the Guardian quotes him as saying.