The Greek Euro-parliament members marked great success after yesterday’s election of Rodi Kratsa from New Democracy and Stavros Lambridis from PASOK as vice-Presidents of the European parliament. Elected for President of the Euro-parliament was the Polish man Jerzy Buzek – the first Eastern European chosen for this position. He has 14 substitutes in total. Rodi Kratsa is the second vice-President; in the last Euro-parliament she was the first vice-President. Yesterdays he received 355 votes – 5 votes less than the Italian Gianni Pittella, who is the first vice-President. Stavros Lambridis was chosen for this position for the first time.

“The Lisbon Treaty and the results from the Euro-parliament elections are showing us that we need to make the parliament more effective in the everyday lives of the citizens and more democratic as an institution,” said Rodi Kratsa for Katemerini newspaper. On the other hand, Stavros Lamridis said that the European parliament needs to become more independent as an institution – not to follow the European council blindly but to become an opponent of the political reality in the European countries.

From the rest Greek Euro-parliament members, it is expected that the former minister of education Marieta Yanakou will work in the foreign affairs commission, Rodi Kratsa will be in the economy commission and the former spokesman of the foreign ministry Georgios Koumoutsakos will be in the transport commission.