Government Vice-President and Foreign Minister Evangelos Venizelos opened the Informal General Affairs Council, which is held in Athens as part of the Greek EU presidency.

Venizelos highlighted the need to enhance the role of the EU and deal with the rise of euroscepticism.

Analysing the political problems arising from the European elections, he referred to the rise of far-right parties, which he reiterated it was a mistake to identify with the economic crisis, because, as he said, there are member states that despite not encountering a major crisis they have experienced such phenomena.

He also referred to euroscepticism, noting that “we have a political euroscepticism” and “economic euroscepticism that derives from the impact of European policies.”

Mr Venizelos made a special reference to growth, the creation of new jobs and underlined that the citizens of Europe “want the combination of national and European policy to produce, in practical terms, the best possible results for them.”

He stressed that “what is really needed now is the formulation of a comprehensive narrative for Europe; a narrative that requires agreements amongst the European political parties and amongst the member states.”