SYRIZA slams Mendoni over 'Stern Collection' agreements

It claimed the agreements were signed on July 21, when "Greece was swept up in the violent wake of the unprecedented scandals of the New Democracy government" and described Mendoni as a "dark minister" who had known and covered up for the illegal collector, without initiating any legal proceedings for the return of the antiquities to the Greek state and the country's museums.

"For two years, Ms Mendoni was secretly 'negotiating' the terms of the 'collector' without ever informing the competent authorities, so that no one investigated the origin of the artifacts, the conditions under which they were exported from Greece and the conditions under which they were acquired by Mr. Stern, or the legality of his possession of them, the authenticity of the objects or an estimate of their worth," the announcement said.

It accused Mendoni of flouting the institutions of Greek democracy to benefit Stern and others involved in the illegal agreement that she signed in July, which left the 161 antiquities in New York for an additional 50 years and "having the audacity to call this 'repatriation'."

The main opposition party also criticised Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis for bringing the agreement to parliament and ratifying it in September, over the objections of the opposition parties and archaeologists, thus "covering for Mendoni after the fact" and turning parliament into a "laundry for antiquities smugglers" and ND MPs into "receivers of the proceeds of crime."

"Only a few days had to pass until the archaeologist Dr. Christos Tsirogiannis proved beyond all doubt that the 'Stern Collection' includes the products of antiquities smuggling, as revealed by an articles in 'Athens Voice'," SYRIZA said, highlighting the damage to the reputation of the Greek state and calling for immediate action by justice and the "cancellation of the illegal agreement".