[國際新聞] Violence mars huge austerity demonstrations in Greece parliament, including, central, outside, people

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Violence mars huge austerity demonstrations in Greece

ATHENS - Violence marred huge demonstrations in Greece on Wednesday as unions launched a two-day general strike ahead of a vote on a new bill tightening the financial screws in a bid to stave off bankruptcy.

Police in Athens clashed with protesters outside parliament as more than 70,000 people according to authorities, and 200,000 according to unions, converged on central Syntagma Square.

Four people including two policemen were hurt, according to the ambulance service. Police said four youths were detained at the start of the demonstration, with reports saying firebombs were found in their possession.

Tear gas blanketed central Athens as police fought to keep control, while thousands of peaceful protesters braved the clashes and remained on the square in front of the Greek parliament.

The violence began when some 200 youths hurled themselves at a steel barricade erected outside the parliament building, an AFP reporter said.

A battle later broke out outside a row of luxury hotels on the square and a department store was vandalised as small groups of hooded and masked protesters broke away from the main demonstration.

A presidential guard sentry box was set on fire near the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Greece's foremost military monument next to parliament, before police moved in to clear the area.

The attackers also pelted police with broken masonry and refuse littering the city's streets from a two-week strike by municipal garbage collectors, and smashed a police sentry box near the finance ministry.

Striking taxi owners in another part of the protest who set fire to garbage bins were also sprayed with tear gas and retaliated by throwing bottles at police.

Officers were also attacked in the second city of Thessaloniki where the government's regional headquarters was assaulted by a group of 100 protesters throwing firebombs.

The bulk of demonstrators in Athens, Thessaloniki, Patras, Heraklion and other cities were peaceful despite boiling anger against the new wave of cuts imposed on a country already slogging through nearly two years of belt-tightening.

"I can either pay my taxes or feed my children, I cannot do both," said Sophia Robola, a 35-year-old woman employed at a store shutter company.

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A hundred of her colleagues were recently fired and she has not been paid in four months, she told AFP.


State statistics this week showed unemployment climbing to 16.5 per cent in Greece during a deepening recession. Unions say the real figure is much higher, and will hit 26 per cent next year.


The new austerity bill introduces collective wage amendments, major tax break cuts, a new civil service salary system and temporary layoffs for thousands of public sector staff.


Deputies "should think twice and three times against what they are about to do to a people living through social barbarism," warned Yiannis Panagopoulos, head of Greece's main union GSEE that represents the private sector.


More protests are scheduled for Thursday, when leftist and Communist unions plan to encircle parliament.


"Today and tomorrow is the greatest general strike, the greatest mobilization by the Greek people against the unfair, anti-social and ineffective measures brought by the government and its creditors," Panagopoulos said.


The government has repeatedly warned that failure to pass the legislation on Thursday ahead of an EU crisis summit on Sunday would prompt Greece's peers to block the release of loans and cause a payments freeze.


"If this bill is not approved, the government cannot represent the country at the summit, it cannot negotiate," Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos warned parliament on Tuesday.


The government is expected to weather the vote, but a number of ruling party deputies have threatened to oppose an amendment to collective wage agreements.


Chief among them is former labour minister Louka Katseli, who faces dismissal from the ruling party group, a move that would lower the government's dwindling strength in the 300-seat chamber to 153 deputies

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Greek unions on Wednesday launched a two-day general strike in an all-out effort to block a new austerity bill that parliament must pass this week to forestall a state bankruptcy.