* The Greek government at risk of being brought down

* The Greek Finance Minister was not told about the referendum

* Stocks of Greek banks and the European currency drop sharply

Yesterday, Greek PM George Papandreou took the entire world by surprise, announcing that he would organize a referendum in the country and would request a vote of confidence in the Parliament on the bailout agreement passed last week at the summit of the European leaders in Brussels.

"The will of the Greek people will win", said Papandreou, before the socialist parliamentary group, adding that he would also request a vote of confidence in the parliament on the agreement concerning the Greek support.

"Do the Greeks want the implementation of the new agreement or do they reject it? If the Greeks do not want it, then it will not be enacted", the Prime Minister said.

Last week the EU leaders have reached a deal with the banks on a 50% haircut on Greek bonds, held by private lenders. The agreement involved the cancellation of 100 billion Euros out of the country"s total bond debt of 350 billion Euros.

Furthermore, Athens will receive new international loans as part of an agreement of 130 billion Euros, by the end of 2014. The program will replace the previous agreement of 109 billion Euros, which was decided in July, by the EU and the IMF.

In turn, Athens must accept a tightening of the control of its budget policy and impose strict austerity measures. This caused repeated protests of the Greek population, and last week demonstrations occurred all over the country, some of them turning violent.

The Greek PM is being criticized by the members of his own party and by the European MPs, after announcing that he would call for a referendum, taking on the risk of losing the vote of confidence in the Parliament.

Some of the members of the gov