Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Wednesday during a video conference organised by the Brookings Institute and Miller Center of Virginia University that the European Commission’s proposal is positive, not only for Greece but for all Europe.

“The European Commission announced today a very ambitious programme, what we call a recovery plan,” he said, adding that Greece is going to be a big beneficiary.

As for the measures Greece has taken, Mitsotakis said: “We moved very quickly to protect jobs and support the income of those whose employment was temporarily suspended.”

“The package we put in place was big compared to our standards but not outside the scope of what we can deal with….We have struck the right balance, at least that is what the markets and the international rating agencies seem to believe,” he underlined.

However, he said that the big challenge is tourism. “We still don’t know how many people will come to Greece. We will gradually open for countries with similar epidemiological conditions as Greece. We do expect some tourism but we know that we will take a big hit,” he said.

He concluded that he is cautiously optimistic that the government has taken the right measures to absorb as much as possible from the initial shock but the challenge in September will be to put Greece back on a growth track.