Athens: Police fired tear gas and clashed
with demonstrators in Athens after some 50,000 people finished
a peaceful march against cutbacks intended to fix the
country's debt crisis.
The violence lasted about 30 minutes, when scores of
youths hurled rocks, red paint and plastic bottles near
parliament. Police said at least two people were detained,
while several storefronts were vandalized.
Windows were smashed at the Finance Ministry's General
Accounting Office, which has been accused by the European
Union of slipshod statistics-keeping that made the financial
crisis worse.
The day's protests were otherwise peaceful. Labor unions
organized the protest march amid a 24-hour general strike that
grounded flights, shut schools and crippled public services,
in a show of strength against the government.
The walkout comes as Greece is considering tougher
austerity measures to ward off a financial crisis that has
undermined the euro and raised fears that financial market
contagion will spread to other weak economies such as
Portugal, Spain and Italy. The European Union has issued a
vague promise to support Greece, which has some euro53 billion
in debt coming due this year, but the government of Prime
Minister George Papandreou has pressed for more specific
guarantees to shore up market confidence.
PTI
First Published: Wednesday, February 24, 2010, 21:22