New Democracy

Greece’s anti-terrorism squad was investigating on Sunday an apparent attack at the headquarters of the co-ruling Socialist PASOK party after two bullets pierced its windows, police said.

Greeks began voting in a second round of local and European Parliament elections on Sunday, seen as a litmus test for support for Prime Minister Antonis Samaras’s shaky government.

In his last campaign speech before Sunday's European Parliament and local elections, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras admitted on Friday that a SYRIZA victory might bring the government down but implored voters to back New Democracy and ensure Greece does not “turn back.”

By Eleni Chrepa & Nikos Chrysoloras

Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, who presided over Greece’s return to capital markets, faces a test of his ruling coalition’s stability in European and local elections this weekend amid a challenge from bailout opponents.

Sunday's European Parliament elections are not a referendum for the conservative-led administration, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras said Friday while warning however against an 'accident' that would create instability in the country.

With SYRIZA leading in two new opinion polls on Thursday, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras accused the opposition party of risking “blowing everything into the air” by threatening to push for snap elections if it comes out on top in Sunday’s polls.

By Costas Iordanidis

Three days before Greeks vote in the country’s second round of local elections, along with those for the European Parliament, the political system appears to have dropped the ball. The main reason is that municipal and regional candidates – especially in Athens and the Attica region – are seeking to extract Golden Dawn’s share in the runoff vote.

People wait at a bus stop beneath a campaign poster for New Democracy in central Athens on Wednesday.

With just a few days left before the crucial double elections on Sunday, party leaders intensified their campaigning on Wednesday with their position on the threat posed by neofacist Golden Dawn a key focus of much of the rhetoric.

SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras on Wednesday gave the clearest indication yet regarding what kind of result in Sunday’s European Parliament vote would, in his view, give the opposition party the impetus to call for snap elections.

Former Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis on Wednesday urged voters to back New Democracy in Sunday’s local and European Parliament elections.

The ex-premier and New Democracy chief noted that the party's strength would safeguard "the country's necessary political stability."

People read newspaper headlines featuring the results of the first round of local elections, in central Athens, on Monday.