Clashes intensified today between protesters and police firing tear gas outside the Greek parliament as an opposition lawmaker said she would back government austerity measures to prevent a debt default.
Correspondents reported just after 1:30 pm (1030 GMT) the latest bid by thousands of anti-riot cops surrounding the parliament to disperse massed ranks of protesters who had hurled firecrackers, rocks and metal barriers at security forces over the morning.
The 28.4-billion-euro ($40 billion) austerity plan is a condition for 12 billion euros of emergency loans needed by mid-July from stressed eurozone partners and the International Monetary Fund, and Elsa Papadimitriou's decision makes the plan more likely to pass.
She told the floor shortly before voting was due to begin that she will back Prime Minister George Papandreou's proposals.
"Yes indeed," she said. "To act with patriotism is to support the consensus and cooperation... The plan is a solution, necessary... but budgetary asphyxiation and economic suicide are not," she added.
One Socialist lawmaker repeated during the debate that he may vote against the package, in protest at plans to sell off part of the state's majority holding in the national electricity company, although with a majority of five Papandreou looks increasingly secure.
On the second day of a 48-hour general strike, demonstrators, many wearing masks, said they would go toe-to-toe with nearly 5,000 police in a bid to down the hated package of taxes, spending cuts and sell-offs deemed essential for wider eurozone stability.
"It's us or them," 40-year-old lawyer Rena Nenedaki told AFP during separate early-morning clashes downtown. "The new budget plans and the deal with the EU and the IMF will destroy our country -- it will rip the guts out of workers, the unemployed and our children."
Economics student Alexandros added that if the government "doesn't fall, we will stay in the streets for another month if need be."
The strike brought about blanket power cuts and ground transport in the capital to a halt on Tuesday.
A second vote on the detail behind the measures has still to be held tomorrow.
"It's the moment of truth for the country," said Socialist MP Mihalis Katrinis during Tuesday night's parliamentary debate. "There is no other solution."
Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said that while the measures were "unjust" and "harsh," a vote in favour would be "positive" for the country, and represent "courageous action on the part of deputies."
One idea under discussion within the government, according to an official who refused to be named, is to delay until next year contested plans to sell off a government stake in the national electricity company in a bid to ensure support from waverers.
However, it remains to be seen how that would go down with European Union and IMF negotiators who have made the privatisation of a dozen utilities and other public assets including water a priority, with the goal of raising 50 billion euros by 2015.
New IMF chief Christine Lagarde has urged opposition lawmakers to support the government and vote for the package, saying Tuesday the austerity measures were needed to save Greece's "destiny".
EU president Herman Van Rompuy said approval of the package was "crucial for the Greek people, but also for the eurozone and the stability of the world economy."
The new measures were drawn up to meet EU and IMF conditions for further bailout support, after a 110-billion-euro rescue last year.
If passed, these creditors could authorise as early as Sunday 12 billion euros in blocked funds needed to stave off bankruptcy for the Athens government when massive repayments fall due in mid-July.
They would then thrash out how much banks and other private creditors will contribute by way of a 'rollover' of existing debts.