Protesters set fire to a major department store in central Athens and torched the city's giant Christmas tree outside Parliament yesterday as anti-government protests worsened.
Thousands of protesters smashed the windows of banks and businesses, government ministries, and set fire to garbage containers, filling the air with acrid smoke in a third day of protests against the shooting of a 15-year-old on Saturday. Thousands of rock-throwing youths staged running battles with police in central Athens yesterday in a third day of demonstrations at the police killing of a teenage boy which has unleashed anger at economic hardships.
Tear gas filled Syntagma square outside Greece's Parliament as police clashed with left-wing demonstrators, beating some with batons and detaining others. Protests were reported in more than 10 cities across the nation of 11 million people, including Thessaloniki and the tourist islands of Crete and Corfu.
More than 130 shops have already been destroyed in the capital, crushing retailers' hope that Christmas would compensate for Greece's darkening economic outlook. Police have detained 35 people in Athens.
With a 24-hour general strike due tomorrow against economic reforms, analysts said Greece's worst riots in decades looked set to continue and could threaten the conservative government, which has a one-seat parliamentary majority.
"Enough with this government, which doesn't understand the problems of this country," said George Papandreou, leader of socialist Pasok opposition party.
The socialists already held a strong lead in opinion polls before the riots, benefiting from disenchantment at the ruling New Democracy party's privatisations and pension reforms. Political analysts say an early election could be called next year.
Anger at the killing of 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropoulos by a policeman on Saturday has even reached Greeks living overseas, who staged protests in London and Berlin.
As night fell on the Greek capital, thousands marched arm-in-arm through the city's main streets. Anarchists smashed car windows and chanted "Cops, Pigs, Murders". Some threw fire bombs at police and, for a third night, businesses burned and explosions rang out.
"Police have lost control. The dead kid was only an excuse. It seems the police are not on the side of the people, that's why people support the youths," said Alexandros, a teacher who declined to give his second name.
The shooting angered Greek youths, resentful at a widening gap between rich and poor, made worse by the global credit crisis. Violence at student rallies and fire bomb attacks by anarchists are common, especially in Athens's Exarchia district where the boy was shot.
More than a dozen police stations in Athens were damaged by demonstrators, who also raided a small pro-government newspaper and broke into a weapons shop, emerging with ninja swords and knives. Hundreds of students occupied university buildings, playing cat-and-mouse with police who are forbidden to enter.