Prime Minister George Papandreou, addressing the Economist's conference in Athens on Wednesday evening, stressed that "a small fire, a spark must not be allowed to get out of control and become a threat for the eurozone."

Papandreou said that it appeared from the situation that has been created from the beginning of the crisis that "the markets do not ultimately regulate themselves and they do not always function rationally," while for the specific case he said that the markets "are afraid and evaluate by depending on the worst possible scenario and not the most probable."

The prime minister mentioned as an example the present increase in spreads to a greater degree than some time ago, "when there was neither the government's Stability Programme nor the implementation of checks, or political will for the support of Greece and even more so when there was no support mechanism."

Papandreou referred to all the measures enacted by the government and stressed "we are ready to undertake painful measures, as well as to proceed with deep and structural changes in institutions and structures."

Focusing on foreign policy, he said "we are renewing the policy that we were implementing in the Balkans," and reiterated his proposal on the accession of the western Balkans to the European Union by 2014, saying that such a development would also "constitute a catalyst for the solving of problems, such as that of Kosovo, as well as the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM)," while regarding the upcoming visit to Athens by Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan he spoke of "a renewal of the rapprochement that began in 2000."

"We hope that this will also be the beginning of a dialogue, so that we can handle issues such as the delineation of the continental shelf and the termination of the presence of the occupation troops in Cyprus," Papandreou said and at this point in his address he hailed the presence at the conference of both Serb Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic and of the President of the Republic of Cyprus Demetris Christofias.