Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has called for snap general elections after his leftist Syriza party suffered a severe beating in Sunday’s European and regional elections.

Opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis, whose New Democracy Party was up almost ten percentage points over Syriza, called on Tsipras to resign immediately.

“The prime minister must assume his responsibilities,” Mr Mitsotakis said. “He must resign and the country should hold national elections as soon as possible.”

In a speech, Tsipras said he would meet with Greek president Pavlos Pavlopoulos to discuss calling elections immediately after the conclusion of a second round of local Greek elections scheduled for next week.

Poll results show that Syriza won about 24 percent of the vote in the European Parliament election, while New Democracy party won 33 percent.

Tsipras, who has been in power since 2015, admitted that the “outcome was not up to our expectations.”