National Council (Greece)

By the end of 1943, the National Liberation Front (EAM), sponsored by the Communist Party of Greece, and its armed wing, the Greek People's Liberation Army (ELAS), had emerged as by far the strongest faction in the Greek Resistance movement: ELAS alone numbered some 50,000 members, while EAM and its various subsidiary movements comprised over 500,000 people out of Greece's seven-million-strong population.

[5][9] By way of comparison, in the January 1936 elections, the last to be held in Greece before the war (and the imposition of the authoritarian Metaxas Regime), only 1,278,085 people (all men) voted.

[7] George Couvaras, a Greek-American OSS agent present in "Free Greece" at the time, reported that "the election was a pretty fair one", and that it demonstrated the ascendancy of EAM over the old pre-war political system as well as the widespread rejection of the monarchy among the populace.

[7][9] The elected councillors represented a broad cross-section of Greek society: 2 bishops and 2 priests, 5 university professors, 8 generals and 6 lower-ranking officers, 20 civil servants, 5 industrialists, 15 doctors of medicine, 25 lawyers, 22 labourers, 23 farmers, 10 newspapermen, 10 scientists, 9 high school teachers, etc.

[9] After sending official greetings to the Allied governments, including Yugoslavia and China,[9] the assembly heard a number of reports by the PEEA ministers on the military situation, on "people's justice", on agricultural and educational reform, on finance and labour rights, etc.

In the end, in the Lebanon conference, EAM was obliged to accept a reduced participation in a cabinet of national unity headed by Georgios Papandreou.