A protester armed with a hammer runs to avoid tear gas during clashes by the parliament in Syntagma square (Reuters)
Fresh clashes broke out between demonstrators and police outside parliament on Tuesday evening, hours after police fired teargas to disperse youths hurling petrol bombs at them. ...
Protesters, many dressed in black, threw makeshift bombs and stones at police, who responded with teargas and formed a cordon outside parliament. Inside, lawmakers were in the final stages of a debate on the 2012 budget packed with unpopular austerity measures.
As New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras took the podium in parliament to defend the 2012 budget, police outside chased youths into narrow side streets.
Over two dozen people suffered minor injuries, police and a Reuters journalist said. Fifteen people were detained.
The turnout was lower than similar protests in previous years and other recent demonstrations that drew tens of thousands, but remained a powerful reminder of the rising anger over austerity measures prescribed by the country's creditors.
Many protestors chanted slogans against the EU and IMF as they marched to parliament. Some held up banners like "Rise and join the December revolution". Minor clashes also broke out in the northern city of Thessaloniki.
Earlier in the day, violence erupted when thousands of demonstrators took to the streets in central Athens to mark the police shooting of a student in 2008.
Police fired tear gas at dozens of hooded youths hurling petrol bombs and stones outside parliament on Tuesday ahead of a vote on the 2012 budget that spells more belt-tightening for austerity-hit Greeks.
Police were pelted with pieces of broken pavement, wooden sticks and petrol bombs for nearly an hour outside parliament before the protesters were dispersed.
Small groups set garbage containers on fire and smashed some shop and bank windows in other areas. At least 10 people were slightly injured, police said.
Many of the marchers chanted slogans against austerity measures prescribed by the European Union and the IMF, the debt-choked country's international lenders, and held up banners like "Social Revolution Now" as they marched to parliament.
"There is a silent anger, something like an undertow, and this is dangerous," said Mary Bossis, professor of International Security at the University of Piraeus. "I expect more people to join the second march, which will probably be more violent."
Since the country's debt crisis erupted in 2009, Greeks have repeatedly staged protests against austerity, which has helped push the country into a fourth year of recession and driven youth unemployment to a record high of more than 43 percent.
In 2008, thousands of youths angry over unemployment and political graft battled police for weeks after 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropoulos was shot dead.
They trashed shops, attacked public buildings and burned cars, making central Athens look like a war zone for weeks.
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