Greek PM says will call snap elections after June 2

ATHENS- Agence France-Presse

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said on May 26 he would call for early polls next month after a drubbing at European and local elections.

"Following the second round of local elections (on June 2), I will ask the president to immediately call national elections," Tsipras said in a televised address.

A likely date for the ballot is June 30, news reports said.

With about a third of polling stations accounted for, Tsipras' leftist Syriza party scored less than 24 percent in the European ballot compared to more than 33 percent for the main opposition conservative party New Democracy.

And in local elections, early results showed New Democracy in control, or securing outright, the bulk of Greece's 13 regions.

"I will not run away or quit the struggle for equality, solidarity, social justice," said Tsipras, Greece's youngest prime minister in 150 years and the first avowed atheist leader.

"The electoral result... is not worthy of our expectations," he said.

New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis had earlier called on Tsipras to resign.

Tsipras' four-year term was originally to run until the autumn.