Addressing his party’s parliamentary group on Monday, Greek PM Alexis Tsipras claimed his government was not targeting his political opponents. Commenting on the revelations over the Novartis pharmaceutical scandal that has gripped the public life in Greece, with a number of high profile politicians from opposition parties New Democracy and PASOK, including former PM Antonis Samaras being accused of illicit actions and receiving bribes, the Greek PM dismissed criticism that he was going after his political opponents. “Some are shamelessly claiming that there is not even a scandal”, he stressed adding that the government would do everything in its powers to shed light on the scandal and the Greek state would seek economic compensation for the loss it incurred due to the scandal.

Responding to those who reacted against the whole case, he spoke of “demagoguery whenever one gets caught red-handed”, adding that “there was not even a single case of a scandal being revealed that was not accompanied by the known ‘political prosecution cassette’, and today we are seeing it again, the same trifles, toxic, undermining things”. “It is another thing to make a political estimation and to speculate politically, and a different thing to be faced with concrete allegations in a massive case file”, the PM said.